











/><^ '-' 



/^ 



''-n^o^ 






%.^^ :'M^' \/ .•^■- %/ " 









% -^^ 



AT 



0^ 











^o. 















.^■^ 






^^ 




• ^ 



4 O 




" Wliat are you going to <]o about it ?" said 
William M. Tweed. 
See Joseph H. Choate's answer, Letter XXIX. 



THIRTY YHARS 



OF e^ iJ I 



New York Politics 



UP-TO-DATE 



WITH . ILLUSTRATIONS 



BY ^ 

MATTHEW P. BREEN 

Member of the New York Bar, and Ex-ISIember of the State Legislature 



PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR 
New York, 1899 



r'tvERfD 



^0 






, ^1421 

Copyright 1899 



MATTHEW P. BREEN 



^OfCor 



j£coNnoo»»y 



JOHN POLHEMUS PRINTING COMPANY, 
NEW YORK. 






PREFACE. 

This work, although of a political character, is in no sense 
partisan in its scope, spirit or intention. It is written without 
fear or favor and without conscious prejudice or passion. 

Founded upon the author's personal experience and obser- 
vation, while officially connected with the Municipal and State 
Governments and while participating in political movements 
relating to them, as well as upon public records and other 
sources of information, it aims at being more than mere 
annals of the period with which it deals, and, while giving 
the facts with all possible accuracy, seeks to look beneath the 
surface of events and discover the motives and designs under- 
lying political actions and conduct. Although not coming 
under the category of light reading, many humorous episodes 
are recorded in its pages, all of which have been introduced 
only with the view of correctly representing New York 
political life. The letters make a coherent narrative, yet 
every chapter is complete in itself and may be read with 
interest, irrespective of what precedes or follows it. 

While freely criticising the many abuses of our Municipal 
Government, I have undertaken in the opening chapters to 
correct the impression which prevails in some quarters, that 
they have had their origin in our system of government, and 
to show that, however great these abuses, our institutions 
contain within themselves an inherent remedy by which they 
can be corrected and cured, and that, like the Angels of Mil- 
ton's Epic, for every wound inflicted they possess a self-heal- 
ing virtue. 

Many foreigners are prone to assume that corruption in the 
government of New York City, the Metropolis of the Western 
Hemisphere, necessarily implies kindred corruption through- 
out the Avhole fabric. State and Federal. 

The assumption, however erroneous, is perhaps natural. 
There is no room for doubt that the scandals arising out 



iv 

of the misrule of New York City, during the last three dec 
ades, have brouglit discredit and obloquy on American insti- 
tutions. It is illogical and unfair, however, to draw sweeping 
conclusions from narrow and restricted premises. 

Ill my endeavor to demonstrate that the blame must rest 
with ourselves until we remove the conditions whicli we know 
to be so hurtful, I have aimed at taking the dial, so to speak, 
from off the political clock and exhibiting the mechanism 
and its movements within. 

Vital facts and conditions, nowhere else collected and clas- 
sified, are disclosed ; and some thoughtful, perhaps partial, 
readers of portions of the original manuscript, believe that 
exhibiting these conditions in a collective form ought to 
arouse a somewhat slumbrous public conscience, by showing 
how and why the people are themselves to blame for toler- 
ating the insolent rule of Kings and Bosses. 

When the attention of the stockholders of any large mer- 
cantile or manufacturing enterprise is drawn to positive proof 
of wrongdoing on the part of their selected manager or 
agents, they usually are prompt to protect their money, credit 
and lienor, by changing the management and improving the 
system. Every citizen of G-reater New York is a shareholder 
in this mighty municipal corporation. All of them are tax- 
payers, directly or indirectly. If their local government is 
corrupt, inefficient, wasteful or scandalous, the blame is their 
own. 

Towards the cure of any serious ailment in the body politic, 
as in the human body, a correct diagnosis is an essential step. 
This book, in striving to point out the nature and location of 
the disease in our Municipal Grovernment, shows how political 
"Machines" acquire, solidify and maintain their power and 
control. Deep, strong and tortuous are the roots of long- 
established Bossism ; but the remedy is always at hand — one 
too which the people can readily enforce, whenever a 
righteous anger shall have aroused them from their lethargy 
and impelled them to act resolutely and steadily, not 
spasmodically, 

M, P. B. 



LIST OF PORTRAITS. 



WILLIAM M. TWEED. 

A. OAKEYHALL. 

JAMES T. BRADY. 

GEORGE G. BARNARD. 

CHARLES O'CONOR. 

PETER B. SWEENY. 

NO All DAVIS. 

RICHARD B. CONNOLLY. 

DAVID DUDLEY FIELD. 

JOHN KELLY. 

ROSCOE CONKLING. 

JOHN GRAHAM. 

JAY GOULD. 

SAMUEL J. TILDEN. 

JOSEPH H. CHOATE. 

JAMES FISK, Jr. 

WILLIAM M. EVARTS. 

THOMAS C. PL ATT. 

WHEELER H. PECKHAM. 

DAVID B. HILL. 

W. BOURKE COCKRAN. 

RICHARD CROKER. 



CHARACTER ILLUSTRATIONS : 

JUDGE "DAN" BREEZY. 
JUDGE "GUS." HEBERMANN. 



CONTENTS. 



LETTER I. 

Object and Scope of These Letters— Making Clear the 
Mystery of American Politics — •Pen Pictures of 
Peculiar and Prominent Characters — Secrets of the 
Inner Circle — Remarkable Change in Foreign Senti- 
ment Concerning the United States — Now Regarded 
as Something More than an Heiress-Hothouse for 
Bankrupt European Nobility 1 

LETTER IL 

How English Prestige in Europe Was Affected by Ameri- 
can Independence — The Boasted British Constitu- 
tion — Fundamental Difference Between It and the 
Constitution of the United States — How the Latter 
is Venerated by American Citizens — Unrestrained 
Authority of the British Parliament— The Blessings 
and Dangers of Liberty 10 

LETTER IIL 
Mysteries of Municipal Affairs — Far Reaching ''Pulls" 
of a Hidden Power — A Subservient and Corrupt 
Judiciary — How Judges were Seduced from the Paths 
of Rectitude — Apparent Invincibility of the Boss 
and his Adherents — His Grasping Propensities — 
New Phase of an Old Evil— The Peril Which Con- 
fronts Our Citizens To-day 20 

LETTER IV. 
How Absolute Power of the Ring Was Acquired — Origin 
of the Tammany Society — Its Importance in the 



Early Days of the Republic — Its Seizure by Tweed 
and His Associates to Promote Their Supremacy — 
The Source and Explanation of Oue-Man Power in 
the Democratic Organization — The Primary Election 
Farce — Wheels Within Wheels — Political Patronage 
and the Uses Made of It 30 

LETTER V. 

How a Boss Was Built Up — The Time and '' Sacrifices^' 
Required — Tweed's Early Youth and Pig-Tail Expe- 
riences — Stepping-Stone to His Twenty Years of Offi- 
cial Life — An Instance of His Kindness of Heart and 
Great Generosity — His Tact as a Politician — Shrewd- 
ness Displayed by Him in Selecting and Placing His 
Adjutants — Why He Desired to Secure Control of the 
Governorship — His Efforts to Rout Albany Marau- 
ders — Ambitious Plans He Had Mapped Out 45 

LETTER VL 
Extending Kew York Tactics to the Suburbs — How 
Greek Met Greek at Highbridgeville — Proposed 
Attempt of Ruffians to Raid a Primary Meeting 
Checked by a Loaded Cannon — Colonel Mooney's 
Victory and How He Became Master of the Situa- 
tion — A Square Deal That Was Not Intended — How 
the Colonel Beat the '' Machine" at Its Own Game. 59 

LETTER Vn. 
The Old Volunteer Fire Department and Its Fascina- 
tion — How it Differed from the Present Fire System — 
Good Conduct of the "Old Boys" when Disbanded 
— How They Used to " Amuse" Themselves After a 
Fire — A Melee in Which Senator "Dave " Broderick 
Lost His Fire Cap — Harry Howard's Love Romance, 
and How He Made Mayor Fernando Wood Act 
'' Square " For Once— The Relic of the Volunteer 
Department in Mount Morris Park QS 



K 



83 



LETTER VIII. 

L.stinguished Lobbyists at Albany— Originator in this 
State of tlie Third House— Skilled Diplomats 
and their Successful Manoeuvres— A Coup d'Etat in 
the State Senate— Adroitness of a Member in Turn- 
ing a Sharp Corner— Important Bridge Contest Be- 
tween Albany and Troy— How a Cute Lobbyist on a 
Losing Side Turned Up a Winner— Apparently 
Trivial Incident that Changed the Course of an Im- 
portant Measure 

LETTER IX. 

Pluck Displayed By Tweed in His Early Political Career 
—How He Combated the Omnibus Monopoly— What 
it Cost Thirteen Aldermen to Disregard an Injunc- 
tion—Thirty Years of Incessant Struggle for a Broad- 
way Railroad— Sad Fate of the Original Projector- 
Public Clamor and Its Victims— How a Washington 
Boss Was Hounded Almost to Death; Then Ap- 
plauded as a Hero and an Ovation Extended to Him. 95 

LETTER X. 
Attempt to Enforce Obsolete Blue Laws in the Metropo- 
lis—The Boomerang Effects of an Arbitrary Excise 
Enactment— Indignant Response of the Metropolis 
to Sectional Legislation— Partisan Method of 
Interpreting a Sumptuary Law— Why Liquor Saloons 
Became Political Centres— When a Presidential 
Election Was Lost Through the Sabbatarian Efforts 
of a New Jersey Parson, Who Was Henry Clay's 
" Burchard "— How a Sunday "Blue Law" Saved 
the Staten Island Ferry Company from Consequential 

Damages 

LETTER XL 
Boss Tweed's Appearance as Senabpr at the State Capital 
—His Ambition aoes MarcUiug on— Feeble Attempt 



10^ 



R 

to Check His Progress — He Elects the Speaker, 
"Fixes" the Committees, and Settles Down to Busi- 
ness — An Unexpected '•' Fire in the Rear" — Mayor 
Hoffman Confronted with a Realizing Sense of His 
Position — The Old Tax Levies and the Art 
and Science of Legislative Legerdemain — Horace 
Greeley's Scathing Denunciation of Tweed and the 
Tammany Leeches 119 

LETTER XIL 
Memorable Erie Railroad Contest — Judiciary of the 
Metropolis Used as Bulls and Bears — Action of an 
Erie Stock-Holder Against Judge Barnard and Com- 
modore Vanderbilt for Joint Conspiracy — Millions 
Expended in Litigation and Legislative Lubrication 
to Save Millions Filched from the People — The 
'' Black Horse Cavalry " on the Rampage — Eagerness 
of an Unsophisticated Legislator to be Corrupted — 
Sudden Collapse of High Expectations — How Tweed 
Managed to be on Both Sides in Two Big Fights — 
Litigation Which Ended in Murder — The Body 
Found Floating in the North River 133 

LETTER XIIL 
Surroundings of a Local Political Boss — Keen Business 
Shrewdness of a New York Alderman — -His Onerous 
Unofficial Duties — Daily Attendance at Police Courts, 
Wakes and Funerals — How He Managed to *'Run " 
an Undertaker, and Fixed Obsequies to Suit His 
Personal Convenience — A Bar-room Bouncer and the 
Peculiarities of His Occupation 147 

LETTER XIV. 

Diamond Days of tlie Ring — When the Professional 
Politician Was in His Glory — A Perpetual Smile 
and a Prodigious G^m His Stock in Trade — How 
Favorites of the Ring Who Had Never Read a Law 



154 



162 



Book Became Lawyers— When Judge Barnard Had 
^'Some Fun With the B.)ys "-Preliminaries to a 
Local Convention— Preposterous Attempt of an Un- 
slated Nominee to Question a Local Boss about a 

Primary '■' 

LETTER XV. 
Reconstruction, Liipeachment and Amnesty-Desperate 
Attempt of Ambitious Political Leaders to Unseat 
a President— Their Defeat after a Long and Persis- 
tent Struggle— Proclamation Which ilade Fourth of 
July a Reunion Jubilee— Democratic National Con- 
vention at Tammany Hall-How Horatio Seymour 
Was Nominated for the Presidency— Why We Vote 
for Electors Instead of Voting Direct for President 
and Vice-President-Advantages of the Electoral 

System 

LETTER XVI. 
Bribery AYhich Was Not Bribery-Investigating Com- 
mittees Hard to Convince-Two Peculiar Cases- 
Rumpus Over the Interpretation of a Simple 
Word— More Secrets of Legislation— Practical Illus- 
trations of the Use of the Lobby-The - Contingent 
Method of Passing a Blll-An Instance m Which 
Aldermen Were not " Treated Right." ^'^ 

LETTER XVII. 

Shaping a State Convention for Popular Success-Po- 
litical Sagacity Outgenerals. Vengeful Jealousy- 
Democracy's Great Triumph in the Empire State- 
Plotters for Dissension Sowing Seeds of Discord m 
the Metropolis-Wire Pullers of the Young Democ- 
racy Revolt-E^^traordinary Charter Contest m the 
Legislature-Combination Against and Attempted 
Deposition of Tweed-Complete Rout of his Ad- 
versaries-Philanthropist and Gambler Bargain Over ^^^ 
Devilled Crabs 



LETTER XVIII. 
Make-Up of a Judicial Convention — Its Subservient and 
Crawling Creatures — The Shabby-Genteel ''Bum" 
— Vain Efforts at Recognition by a "Had-Been" — 
Delay Which Aroused Apprehension of a Hitch — 
Preliminary Speech by an Embryo Citizen — Entrance 
of the ''Honored Leader" of the District — The Ma- 
chine Set in Motion — How a Judge was Nominated 
— Acclaim with Which " the People's Choice " was 
Received — Fervid Enthusiasm and a Grand Rush to 
the Bar 205 

LETTER XIX. 
" Tweed and His Generals " — Last Effort of a Persistent 
Place Hunter to " Taffy " the Boss— Scheme to En- 
able Political Aspirants to Get Near the Head Centre 
— Proposed Statue to Tweed — Why It was not 
Erected — When Peter B. Sweeny Thought His 
Friend Tweed had Gone Crazy — Lark of Oriental 
Club Men — Boss's " Private Business" Door at the 
Delavan House — 219 

LETTER XX. 
Characteristics of a Successful Politician — Generosity 
Indispensable to Popularity — Fate of a Mean Man 
Who Sought Public Office— "Business End" of a 
Nominating Convention — " Dan " Breezy in a Nest 
of "Strikers"-The "Bleeding" Process Practically 
Illustrated — How Campaign Clubs Were Startt'd — 
The Big Show Five Men Made — Audacious Cheek of 
a Target-Sliooting Striker — An Impecunious Candi- 
date of Military Fame in a Tight Place — Trouble 
He Had to Save a Table T 229 

LETTEK XXI. 

"Dan" Breezy's Skilful Management of His Whirlwind 
Canvass — An Acknowledged "Corker " as a Caiidi- 
date — Vindicating His Judicial Dignity to a Torch- 



±iii 

Light Procession — Overpowering Applause Rattles 
His Prepared Speech — Mike Hickey gives the Cue to 
the Judge- Elect — But even Ten-Cent Whiskey Fails 
to Mitigate His Dismal Oratorical Failure ..- 242 

LETTER XXIL 
How the Joke of a Wag Adjourned a Session of the 
Board of Aldermen — Description of an East Side 
Saloon — Its Equipment for Rapid Drinking— How it 
Differed from a Lager Boer Place of Refreshment — 
Noticeable Indifference of Germans to Local Politics 
— The Shiny Hat Brigade and the Duties it had to 
Perform 249 

LETTER XXIIL 
Awakening of the G-erman Element to Its Power and Im- 
portance — Its Political Activity Excites Alarm in 
the Irish Element — Concessions Made in the Shape 
of Nominations — First Teuton Officeholders not a 
Success— What Brought Down a Pompous Oratorical 
Alderman — An Appointee Who Thought He had to 
do Some Work — His Persistency Ended by "Cutting 
His Wind." ...- 258 

LETTER XXIV. 
"Irrepressible Conflict '' Between Two Races — Too Much 
Official Recognition of St. Patrick's Day Breeds 
Trouble — Mayor Hall Reviews a Parade in the Re- 
galia of an Irish Prince — Anger of the German Press 
and Indignation of German Clubs — Political Ava- 
lanche Which Made a Baker State Senator in Spite 
of Himself . . - 267 

LETTER XXV. 

Exciting Legislative Episode Sliowing the Disadvantage 
of Too Small a Majority — How an Ill-Tempered 
Bully Disorganized Legislative Business — A Blow 



Which Dissipated Democratic Supremacy and Pro- 
duced Chaos — Resolve of the Republicans to "Boss 
the Ranch or Block the Game" — How the Gordian 
Knot was Out — Ruin Which Followed the Man Who 
Cut It -- - 278 

LETTER XXVI. 

A Civil Justice in the Halcyon Days of the Ring — The 
Give-and-Take System of Political Advancement — 
Success of Cheek and Log-Rolling — How a Sample 
Civil Justice Opened His Court — Enthusiastic Ad- 
mirers Profoundly Affected by His Inaugural Speech 
— Cunning Attempts to Make Political Capital — 
Deciding a Question of Law by Knock-Down Argu- 
ment — Futile Effort to Crush a Young Advocate — 
The Judge on the Bench Offers to Bet on a Sure 
Thing 293 

LETTER XXVII. 
Three Very Remarkable Men — Mike Walsh, Capt. Isaiah 
Rynders and Count Joannes — The Spartan Band and 
The Empire Club — Mike's Election Squabble with 
John Kelly — His Arrest for Criminal Libel — How 
He Offended His Friend Broderick by Not Commit- 
ting Suicide — Capt. Rynders' Democratic Speech on 
Horseback to a Defeated Whig Nominee — His Good- 
ness of Heart and Kindly Act to Isaac V. Fowler, 
New York's Democratic Postmaster, When in 
Trouble — Count Joannes, a Man of Trials — Always 
in Hot Water 302 

LETTER XXVIIL 
Rumblings Preceding the Storm — Beginning of Popular 
Distrust — Concealment of Financial Conditions — 
Hidden Provision of the Tax Levy which Gave New 
Life to the Ring — Corrupt Practices of the Judiciary 
Denounced by a Fearless Lawyer — What Led to the 



Formation of the Bar Association — How a Willing 
Governor Pulled Tweed's Chestnuts Out of the Fire 
— The Ring Bracing Itself Against Adverse Criti- 
cisms and Entrenching Itself Behind Atrocious 
Legislative Enactments 316 

LETTER XXIX. 
Chiefs of the Tribe of Tammany in Their Glory — Mutual 
Congratulations on Auspicious Conditions — But a 
Powerful Newspaper Begins to "Say Things '^^A 
Presentation of Figures which Startles the Commun- 
ity — Choate's Javelin of Justice — How He Answered 
Tweed's Inquiry of ''What are You Going to Do 
About It?" — Resolutions that Meant Business and 
Worked Wonders 333 

LETTER XXX. 
Marriage of Tweed's Daughter — A Seven Hundred 
Thousand Dollar Wedding — James Gordon Bennett's 
Comment on It — Opening of the New Americus Club 
Building — Tweed's Gala Day While on the Brink of 
a Volcano — Magnificence of the Tiger's Lair at 
Greenwich, Conn. — Practical Jokers of the Club — 
Rowing Race Between John Fox and " Jake " Somer- 
indyke — Simplicity of John Kelly Contrasted with 
the Surroundings of His Successor 341 

LETTER XXXI. 
How the Ring Humbugged the Proud American Citizen 
— A Great Moral Convulsion in the Air — Serious 
Talk at a Secret Conclave — Suggestion of a Xew 
York Vigilance Committee — Experimental Appeal 
to a Corrupt Judge First to T)e Tried — His Unex- 
pected Granting of a Sweeping Injunction — Unsuc- 
cessful Effort to Make a Jonajijof.,l'_Slij)p ery Dick" / 
-^Zig-Zag Fight and Mayor Hall's Topsy Turviness 
— Business Men's Rally to Oust the Municipal 
Thieves^TrTTTITTTTrTriTr^^ , 



LETTER XXXIL 
Comptroller Connolly's Millionaire Whitewashers — The 
" Orange Riot," Its Cause and Serious Result — " The 
Wonderful House that Tweed Built "—When Tam- 
many Hall Was Closed Tight on an Election Night — 
Fragments of the "Unterrified" Trying to Brace 
Each Other Up — Dying Throes of a Remnant of the 
Tweed Regime — Aldermanic Attempt to Impeach 
the Mayor — How the Would-be ''Hold-Overs" Were 
Outgeneralled by Judge Abraham R. Lawrence — 
Evolution of a New Tammany Boss 368 

LETTER XXXIIL 

When Judge George G. Barnard was Triumphantly " Vin- 
dicated," According to Order — His Eccentricity and 
Reckless Humor on. the Bench — A Picturesque 
Judicial Brigand — The Bar Association Pnrsues 
Him — Close Vote of the Assembly Committee on 
the Charges Presented — Finding of the Court of Im- 
peachment — Stripped of Judicial Honors and For- 
ever Disqualified from Holding Office — Fateful End 
of Judge John H. McCann — An Unscrupulous 
Money-Getter Who Fell a Victim to Prosperity 385 

t LETTER XXXIV. 

Solving a Political Enigma — How and Why Democrats 
Supported a Republican for President — Popular Dis- 
gust at Radical Recklessness and Despotism — Well- 
Designed but Unsuccessful Coalition for Peace and 
Prosperity — Attempt to Expel Greeley from the 
Union League Club — The Chappaqua Philosopher 
on His Farm — His Goodness of Heart and Rural Sim- 
plicity — Interviewed by the Female Suffragists — 
Characteristic Anecdotes 407 

LETTER XXXV. 
First Trial of Tweed — Notable Bar Engaged in the Case — 
Wliat Made the Defendant so Confident of Acquittal 



— Ordeal Through Which the Jury Had to Pass — 
T3stiiiicm;5LJi£-^wii-Stiiii_Witnesses — Garvey in Much 
Plaster and Tilden in a Tangle — How Counsel Grid- 
ironed the Statesman — Disappointment of the Judge 
at the Jury's Disagreement — Tweed's Caustic Com- 
ment on the Situation -421 

LETTER XXXVL 
Running the Gauntlet a Second Time Before the Same 
Judge — Unsuccessfl^l Attempt of Tweed's Counsel 
to Change the Situation — Extraordinary Legal Docu- 
ment — Unmistakable Annoyance Betrayed by the 
Judge — Sharp Retorts of Counsel and Court — 
Tactics of the Prosecution a Surprise — Jury Agree on 
a Verdict — " Guilty !" said the Foreman 443 

LETTER XXXVIL 

Three Days of Intense Anxiety — Tweed's Desperate 
Efforts to Obtain a Stay of Proceedings — Unabated 
Confidence of His Enthusiastic Friends — A Strik- 
ingly Dramatic Scene in Court — An Awful Surprise 
— Appeal for Mercy to an Implacable Judge — Audi- 
ence Awe-struck at the Severity of the Sentence — 
Tweed FineJand Sejit to the Penitentiary for 
Twelve Years 457 

LETTER XXXYIII. 
UniqueLegal Proceedings of Surpassing Interest — Tweed's 
Counsel Summoned to the Bar for Contempt — Their 
Protest in Behalf of Their Client Sternly Rebuked — 
Judicial Dignity Vindicated by an Upright Judge — 
Three Leading Lawyers Fined Two Hundred and 
' Fifty Dollars Each — The Real Culprits Exonerated 
and Complimented 472 

LETTER XXXIX. 
An Unpleasant Recollection for the Present Boss — Erratic 
and Reckless Career of James Fisk, Jr. — His Daring 



Enterprises — The Gold Conspiracy and Memorable 
Black Friday — Fisk's Jealousy of and Quarrel with 
Edward S. Stokes — The Woman in the Case — Fatal 
Meeting of the Rivals and the Shooting of Fisk — 
Pathetic Ending of Lawyer Lane, Another Victim of 
the ''Erie Clique," 488 

LETTER XL. 
Escape of " Prince Hal " — His Duplicity and Base Ingrati- 
tude to a Benefactor — Mysterious Gathering at 
Genet's House — His Abduction Prearranged, Even if 
Assassination Were Necessary — Imprisonment of 
Sheriff Brennan and His Deputy, and Death of the 
Former — Tweed's Conduct Under Arrest Compared 
with Genet's — Story of the Man Who Had Charge of 
Both Prisoners - 503 

LETTER XLI. 
Exciting Old-Time Primary in the Sixth Ward — Voters 
in Line Daring an Entire Night and Day — "Big 
Judge " Michael Connolly and Police Justice " Joe " 
Dowling Exchange Backhanded Compliments — How 
a Ward Politician Tested His Inflaence — Getting 
" Ten Days " for a Presumption of Intimacy with 
*'Joe" Dowling — Daring Encounters and Hair- 
breadth Escapes of the Sixth Ward Judge 516 

LETTER XLII. 

Eventful Career of John Morrissey — Evolution of a Prize 
Fighter — Family Quarrels Which Ended in the Roped 
Arena — Morrissey Emerges from His Surroundings, 
Turns IJp a Congressman and Becomes a Power in 
New York Politics — Ceremoniously Visits New York's , 
Mayor in a Swallow-Tail Coat — His Fearlessness and 
Audacity in a Political Canvass — How His First 
Speech in the Legislature was Delivered — Defeated 
the Boss in His Own District — A Triumph Which 
Soon Ended in His Death — Pathetic and Touching 
Ceremonies in the State Legislature 525 



LETTER XLIII. 

Six-Million Civil Suit against Tweed — Critical Condition 
of the People's Legal Champion — Charles O'Conor's 
Reported Death Causes Courts to Adjourn — The Civil 
Suit Progresses and its Satisfactory Condition Elates 
Both Tweed and His Counsel — But O'Conor's Un- 
expected Appearance from His Sick Chamber Causes 
Consternation — His Ghost-Like Aspect in Court — 
Counsel for the Defence Astounded — Greeted 
by Peckham and Carter, his Associates — O'Conor's 
Extraordinary Demand and Success — Tweed Foresees 
his Doom, and Makes Preparation for Flight — 
A Suggestion for Members of the New York Bar... 543 



LETTER XLIV. 

Tweed Faces His Twelve Years^ Sentence in the Peniten- 
tiary — His Strange Hold on the Affections of the 
Masses — The Court of Appeals Conies to his Relief — 
Release Followed by Re- Arrest — Tweed's Escape 
While in Charge of Sheriff's Officers — Hides in the 
Palisades, Disguised as a Woodchopper — His Flight, 
Capture and Return to Ludlow Street Jail — Pathetic 
Appeal to his Prosecutors — His Last Desperate Effort i 
to Secure Freedom — Offers to Surrender and Tell \ 
Everything — All Hope Gone, he Dies Broken- 
Hearted, and is Buried in Greenwood Cemetery 55^ 

LETTER XLV. 

How William M. Evarts Kept His Word— A Remi- 
niscence of the Civil War — Graphic Description of 
the Attack of the Ram Merrimac on the Union Ship 
Cumberland — Making Good a Promise of Seventeen 
Years' Standing — A Characteristic Letter to Post- 
master James — Favor which the Republican Secre- 
tary of State Extended to an Hamble Democrat 571 



LETTER XLVI. 

Bitter Contest Between Boss Kelly and Boss Tilden — ' 
Marvellous Success of the Latter as a Political Man- 
ipulator—How he Paved his "Way to a Presidential 
Nomination — Attaining the Pinnacle of a Life's Am- 
bition only to be Cheated at Last — A Vengeful ''War 
to the Knife" on Governor Lucius Robinson — The 
Tammany Bolt and Its Disastrous Results — Amusing 
Incident at a State Convention — How a Gubernatorial 
Boom was Burst 575 

LETTER XLVIL 

Sequel to the Tammany Bolt — Kelly Runs a State Con- 
vention All His Own — New York Gladiatorial Fight 
Transferred to a Cincinnati Arena — Tilden's Victory 
Over Kelly and Kelly's Triumph Over Tilden — Both 
Disturbers Hors de Combat and Everybody Happy — 
Republican National Convention and Boss Conkling 
— Solidity of the Stalwart Forces — Turning Defeat 
into General Victory — A " Knock Out" Which Brings 
the Winner (Garfield) to the Feet of Grant's Cham- 
pion - .... 591 

LETTER XLVIII. 
Reminiscence of an Important Political Event — Slavery 
andPolitics in Ante-Bellum Times — Vindictivenessof 
a Presidential Boss — Plucky Fight for Popular Sover- 
eignty — Fate of Senators Stephen A. Douglas and 
David C. Broderick — Concentrated Eifort of an 
Administration to Crush John B. Haskin — Triumph 
of Free Speech Over Partisanism — The Wrongs of 
Daniel E. Sickles and How he Avenged Them 608 

LETTER XLIX. 

Boss Kelly in Troubled Waters — Indignation Local and 

General Heaped Upon Him — Sectarian Fight Against 

William R. Grace in a Mayoralty Contest — Kelly's 

Motives Severely Criticised — How Mayor Cooper Un- 



tied an Aldermanic Deadlock — A Beheaded Boss's 
Vindictive Speech — Threatened Revolt in Tammany 
Against One-Man Power — How the First Mayor of 
Greater New York, Robert A. Van Wyck, Almost 
Huptured Tammany Hall 619 

LETTER L. 

Intrigue Which Led to the Nomination of a Mayor — 
(Coalition Between Victorious L'ving Hall and Much- 
Subdued Tammany — Memorable Deal at Westminster 
Hotel — A Hat as a Substitute for a Nominating Con- 
vention — How the Boss Outflanked the Irving Hall 
" Statesmen '^ — Popular Disapprobation of Political 
Huckstering — Narrow Escape from Defeat of United 
Democracy Nominees — An Indication of What 
Independent Democrats Can Do in a Municipal Con- 
test 633 

LETTER LL 

Crisis in the Career of a Republican Boss — Roscoe 
Conkling's Jealousy of James G. Blaine and His 
Eight Against President Garfield — Unexampled 
Quarrel Over Political Patronage — Conkling's Man- 
ceuvres to Boss an Administration — The President's 
Determination to ''Sit Down Upon'' a Would-be 
Dictator — Conkling's Appeal for Vindication a 
Dismal Failure — Assassination of President Gar- 
field — Culmination of Violent Political Excitement — 
Vice-President Arthur Takes the Oath of Office as 
Garfield's Successor 647 

LETTER LII. 

Severe Comment on John Kelly's Early Career — Attempt 
of Dissatisfied Democrats to Capture the Tamn)any 
Society — Those Who Figured as '"Malcontents" — 
The Committee of One-Hundred Movement— Sue- 



cessf ul Formation of a New and Vigorous Democratic 
Organization — Its Debut at a State Convention — 
Tammany DelegatesAgain Out in the Cold — Triumpli 
of the New York County Democracy G63 

LETTER LIII. 

Insecurity of a Sure Thing in Politics — Three 
Cooks Who Spoiled the Broth — How Grover Cleve- 
land Came to the Eront as a Gubernatorial Candi- 
date — President Arthur and KoscoeConkling Uncon- 
sciously Play Into His Hand — Republican Revolt 
Against Presidential Bossism — Mayor Grace and 
Some of His Peculiarities — Alleged Misrepresenta- 
tions to Jay Gould, and What They Cost Him 676 

LETTER LIV. 

** Tammany Without a Boss " as a Subterfuge for Making 
a Boss of a Mayor — Cunning Scheme Which Did Not 
Work — How Arrogance Came Near AYrecking Cleve- 
land's Presidential Aspirations — Exceedingly Close 
Political Contest of 1884 — Conspiracy to Steal New 
York's Electoral Vote — Reluctance of Blaine's 
, Friends to Give Up the Fight — Conkling, Blaine and 
Beecher — Deaths of Arthur, Kelly and Thompson — 
All Victims of Grief and Disappointment 687 

LETTER LV. 

Fickleness of Popular Favor — President Cleveland Ap- 
plauded and Commended, but Defeated in His Own 
State — Singular Apathy at the Nominating Conven- 
tion — Politicians Unwillingly Submit to Uncontroll- 
able Conditions, but Handicap the Nominee with an 
Unpopular Platform — Strife of Governor Hill's 
Friends to Make Him a Presidential Nominee in 
1892 — How they Marred His Chances by a "Snap" 
Convention — Cleveland Nominated a Third Time 
for the Presidency— The National Contest of 1896 ... 708 



xxili 

LETTER LVI. 

Origin of the Borough of The Bronx— A Eegion Always 
Antagonistic to Boss Rule — Unsuccessful Opposition 
of Kelly and Arthur to Annexation of the West- 
chester Towns— Using Gov. John A. Dix as a Cats- 
paw — How the Bosses Avenged Defeat by Holding 
the Acquired Territory in Subjugation— Neglect in 
All Things Except Collecting Taxes— Revolt of a 
Long-Suffering Community — Determined Appeal to 
the State for Relief— A Legislative Investigation 
Which Benefited the People— Triumph of the 
People's Bill — Desperate Effort of the Bosses to 
Nullify the Action of the Legislature — Governor 
Hill Approves the Act of Emancipation From Mis- 
rule. '^21 



LETTER LVII. 

The Exciting Contest Following the Passage of the 
People's Bill — Tammany's Boss Confident of Win- 
ning the Prize at the Polls — Organization of the 
Citizens' Local Improvement Party — Purroy Startled 
by the Nomination of Louis J. Heintz — A Campaign 
of Abuse and Vilification — Tammany's Caricature 
and the People's Lampoon — Champion of Anti- 
Bossism Triumphantly Elected— Cunning Attempt 
to Lure Him into the Wigwam— Programme to Legis- 
late Him Out of Office— Boss McLaughlin Foils the 
Scheme — But the Successful Champion of Popular 
Rights Does Not Long Survive His Victory 742 

LETTER LVIIL 

How Richard Croker Became Boss— A Man of Nerve 
and Cunning — Herculean Efforts of a Few Brainy 
Men to Upbuild Tammany's Shattered Fortunes 



After Kelly's Death — Croker Steals the Credit — 
Saturnalia of County Democracy Leaders — The 
Irish Flag Antics of Mayor Hewitt — Tammany's 
Victory — Croker Controls the New Mayor, 
Assumes Command and Clips the Wings of 
Kivals — An Expert Witness Before Investigat- 
ing Committees — Perhaps the Highest Living 
Authority as to What is "Private Business'^ — 
Croker's Surprising Spring from Indigence to 
Affluence — Now Declares his Intention to Kun 
Judges as Well as Eace Horses — His *'Grreatest 
Political Show on Earth " — But he Promotes Only 
Old "Wheel-Horses", Keeps Out "Eoyal Bengal 
Tigers," Controls the Box Office, Pockets the Gate 
Money, and "It's Dead Easy for him to Keep on 
Top in the Game "—But There's Trouble Ahead 755 

LETTER LIX. 

Editor Stead's Dastardly Attempt to Re-construct Croker 
— Aristotle Eclipsed by the Boss Philosopher — The 
English Editor Laughs and No One Here Blames 
Him — Croker Elucidates Carlyle and PufEs Himself 
— Unable to Recall One Wrong Act in His Whole 
Life, '*No, Not Even One" — The Mazet Committee 
Comes to the Rescue and Makes Croker Talk as We 
Know Him— What the Boss Ought to Do With the 
English Editor 778 

LETTER LX. 

Gossipy Talk with Alderman Curly — Graphic Descrip- 
tion of Boss Croker's Early Career — His Start 
in Politics — A Protege of ex-Sheriff O'Brien — 
Fatal Brawl in a Memorable Election Contest — The 
Alderman Laughs Over the Joke on Larry Doolen, 
and Gives His Ideas of Why the Boss Finds it Ad^ 



vantageous to Go Abroad — Kills Two Birds with One 
Stone and Turns Ilis Shrewd Foresight to Political 
Advantage — The Melanclioly Sti)ry of Judge Led- 
wiih — His Treachery to His Followers Recoils Upon 
Himself — Hovv it Advantaged Judge Barrett and the 
Good Turn Boss Croker Did the Latter 784 



LETTER LXL 

A Political lago and His Treachery — Ties of Friendship 
Between Two Honorable Men Severed by a Moral 
Assassin — Hatching a Nefarious Plot While Enjoy- 
ing the Hospitalities of His Victim — The Outcome 
of a Yachting Excursion — When Joseph J. O'Desde- 
mona Was Slated for Mayor, and How lago Turned 
John Othello Against Him — Secret Meeting of the 
Plotters — lago's U|iroarious Laughter as He Gloats 
over the Details of His Shameless Infamy 796 



LETTER LXIL 

Boss Croker's Audacious Admissions Before the Mazet 
Committee Dissected — Earnest Discussion by Four 
Well-known Club Men — A Conclave More Practical 
and Perhaps More Potential than an "Investigating 
Committee" — The Judiciary of New York City 
Humiliated and Degraded Before the World by 
Croker's Statement — Smothered Indignation of 
Bench and Bar at his Insolence — Tweed Modest 
Compared with liim — What New York Judges 
Should Do — Ex-Governor Hill's Personal Integrity 
Amidst Great Opportunities and Great Temptations 
— Vicissitudes of Rapid Transit — A Public Necessity 
Made a Political Shuttlecock — An Opinion Which 
Was no Opinion, but Which Cost Millions — Lucid 
Explanation of its Far-Reaching Injury - 804 



xxvi 

LETTER LXIIL 

Trickery and Chicanery of Machine Politics — Ostensible 
Foes Combine for Sinister Purposes — Revelation of 
an Ingenions Device to Undo a Candidate for Mayor 
— Cunning Scheme to Gain Press Favor — Influence 
of Corporate Monopolies on Mayoralty Nominations 
— How Boss Piatt was Hoodwinked — The Job that 
Was ''Put Up" on Seth Low— A "Destroying 
Angel" Comes to the Front — Phenomenal Canvass 
Against the Combined Machines — Object Lesson 
for Independent Voters — 825 

LETTER LXIV. 

Curious Fluctuations in the Fortunes of Bossism — Its 
Brief Defeats and Rapid Revivals — Responsibility 
for its Present Audacity — Culpable Neglect of Duty 
by Wealthy and Intelligent Citizens — How to Get 
Rid of Political Wolves — Earnest and Sustained 
Effort the Price of Good Government 837 



THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS 

UP TO DATE. 



LETTER I. 

Object and Scope of These Letters — Making Clear the 
Mystery of American Politics — Pen Pictures of Pecu 
LIAR and Prominent Characters — Secrets of the Inner 
Circle— Remarkable Change in Foreign Sentiment 
Concerning the United States — Now Regarded as 
Something More than an Heiress-Hothouse for Bank- 
rupt European Nobility. 

My dear Dean : 

Returned once more to the turmoil of New York life, I 
look back with exceeding pleasure to tlie short period of 
academic quiet I enjoyed last summer at your home in 
Eno:land : to the conversations and discussions on inter- 
national and other topics, which, sometimes, carried us far 
into the night; to the pleasant intercliange of thought, and 
to the hardly less pleasant ditferences of opinion, which 
had no worse effect than to give fresh stimulus to our 
intellectual enjoyment. Nor, while I remember these 
things with a pleasure all the more keen on account of the 
contrast they offer to the prosaic character of my ordinary 
life, do I forget that you did me the compliment of con- 
gratulating me on the opportunities I had had of witnessing, 
in its most active centre, the struggles and progress of our 
great, but still youthful country, and of suggesting that, as 
my experience of it had extended over many years, I 
should write my reminiscences of American men and 
affairs, as a subject which you yourself would enjoy and 
others would equally appreciate. 

Having access here at home to records and data which 



2 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

were not obtainable on your side of tlie Atlantic, I accord- 
ingly now undertake the task, trusting that you will accept 
my efforts in the same spirit in which our friendly discus- 
sions were carried on while I had the honor of enjoying 
your hospitality. 

These letters of mine will reveal many things which, if 
they do not always attain the dignity of State Secrets, will 
yet possess a vital interest by reason of the light they will 
shed on the evolution of popular government among us in 
the foremost commercial and social centre of the New 
World. Comedy will jostle tragedy in the narrative. 
Indeed, of the comedy there is an embarrassing abundance ; 
but the portions admitted to these pages will be chosen, 
not merely for their piquancy and novelty, but for the 
express and exclusive purpose of pointing a moral or illus- 
trating a condition. 

Many things I shall have to write which will not be com- 
plimentary to men now dead or to men still living. If in 
these disclosures the truth at times has a bitter flavor, the 
blame rests, not with me, but with those whose misdeeds 
merit exposure and reprobation because they have brought 
and still bring odium upon our institutions. My candor 
in this regard will satisfy you that I am no apologist for 
abuses, am not blind to the vices which accompany the 
tense and rapid development of even the highest human 
ideals. 

The friendly and intelligent interest you manifested in 
all that related to the United States proved to me that 
popular government had achieved its proper position in the 
world, and was no longer (as it had often been described) 
an experiment, but a success. It showed that, after a cen- 
tury of trial, the Republic had outlived the shadow of that 
night of misrepresentation and calumny which, at one time, 
seemed almost to threaten its very existence. 

But our American Commonwealth has long since emerged 



THE INFLUENCE OF POLITICS. 3 

far beyond the sphere and influence of such attacks. When 
you now visit its shores you behold the wondrous achieve- 
ments it has wrought in every field of enterprise, and you 
marvel how, within so brief a period, it could have risen to 
a height of power and opulence, which it has taken centur- 
ies for other nations to even imperfectly attain. 

Paradoxical as it may appear, our danger lay, not in our 
weakness but in our prosperity and strength ; for, had we 
been less exposed to envy, we might have been more secure 
in our supposed insignificance. Perhaps the danger is not 
yet past, but we need fear nothing from any open or out- 
side foe, although in our progress and power we mav have 
to guard against pretended friends ; and, while we are en- 
dowed with Samson's strength, we must not forget that 
there are Delilahs among nations no less than among 
women. 

I have had an experience of New York, socially and 
politically, for over thirty years, and, while proposing to 
record some of my more prominent political recollections, 
I may, from time to time, touch upon the social aspects of 
the hour, but only so far as they have been affected by 
political operations and intrigues. All departments of 
life — social, political and religious — are necessarily more or 
less connected, acting and re-acting upon each other ; and 
of no place is this more true than of New York. 

Notwithstanding the principle that every man should 
mind his own business, (a principle more generally observed 
here than in most places), the influence of politics has found 
its way everywhere — into the lawyer's office and the store, 
as well as into the bar-room and the boarding-house, and 
has even dared to ascend the consecrated steps of the altar 
and the pulpit. But, then, politics are naturally regarded 
in this democratic community as a part of every man's 
business, no matter what his special pursuit ; a subject, in 
fact, on which he is not only permitted to think for himself. 



4 THIRTY YExVRS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Imt is called upon to do so as a public duty. This is the 
theory, however little it may be carried out in practice in 
Bome of our municipal communities ; but every citizen, 
M'hether in New York or elsewhere, fancies he does think 
for himself on political matters, and would be likely to 
resent it, as a reflection upon his independence, did you 
venture to hint that he had submissively received his opin- 
ions from any outside source. 

New York is not a very ancient city, but in the two 
hundred and odd years of its existence it has left no social 
or political problem untouched, although one cannot by any 
means say, as did Dr. Johnson of the varied exercises of 
Goldsmith's pen, that it has " touched nothing which it did 
not adorn." Of no other city in the world, however, might 
more complimentaiy things be said, not only as a commer- 
cial factor, but as an agent in social and scientific progress. 
In public and private benevolence it is not surpassed, and 
in heroism of enterprise and liberality of thought it stands 
supreme even among American cities. 

The sums expended annually in charity, and often in the 
quiet and unostentatious way in which the '' left hand know- 
eth not what the right hand doeth," are incalculable. Nor do 
the benefactors wait until wretchedness rises to the surface 
and exposes its shivering and humiliated figure to the world. 
Their benevolence searches far, and penetrates the sordid 
haunts of poverty and sin, comforting the one, counselling 
the other, and relieving both. 

From the hysterical charges occasionally made against 
New York by some emotional moralists, one might think 
the City was a seething cauldron of iniquity from end to 
end, with, as you might say, the Devil stirring the pot, like 
the witches in Macbeth, to make the elements of evil work 
with greater activity and effect. It is no exaggeration to 
say, however, that for every vice in the City there are a 



MISCONCEPTION OF FOREIGN CRITICS. 5 

hundred virtues, and that for every sorrow there are scores 
of comforters. 

Eminently cosmopolitan, New Tork, so far from confin- 
ing itself altogether to the exercise of the virtues, is not, as 
might be expected, even satisfied with the iniquities of 
commonplace communities. Here, we can assert with 
greater truth than we can of any other city in the United 
States, the " sovereign people " sin and reign after a fashion 
peculiarly their own, and with a feverish zeal which almost 
gives to the " wickedness " of other places the semblance 
of virtue. 

There is nothing in the United States that is not interest- 
ing, and you will not, therefore, think me tedious if I dwell 
somewhat upon the subject generally. Evils of all kinds 
there are, both moral and political, as there are in all great 
communities, and evils, too, of a very pronounced character ; 
but the error in connection with them is that they have 
generally been ascribed to the wrong cause. It has been 
hastily said, and accepted as a matter of course by some 
foreign critics, whether from ignorance or ill-nature, or a 
mixture of both, that these evils flow directly from the 
character of the government. The assumption has never 
been accompanied by any argument to speak of ; but, then, 
it has usually been delivered with an air of authority which, 
to the minds of many, had all the force of reason and indi- 
cated the exceptionally keen character of the writer's per- 
ception. Our governmental system has been pompously 
denounced as a " government of the mob." This charge is 
almost obsolete now, but there was a time when, as you are 
aware, it played a very conspicuous part on the stage of 
European, and especially of English, opinion. In the face 
of the fate which has befallen this and kindred exhibitions 
of ignorance or malignity, I have sometimes thought that 
the antiquary might find a very interesting field of opera- 
tions in collecting the fragments (oi moldy remains) of the 



6 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

arguments, accusations, rebukes and predictions of inky hue, 
levelled at the Republic from time to time in the course of 
its history, but now happily or unhappil^' ^ost to the world 
as. wasted efforts of envy or intellect. ' might be as- 

signed an important place in a museum oi psychological 
curiosities, as a reminder to the American people of the 
many dangers they have escaped, and of how much they 
had to be thankful for to the Providence who controls 
critics and kingdoms alike. 

During the immoral eccentricities of the Tweed regime 
in New York, some gentlemen Avho had not quite forgotten 
their school-boy reading, remembering that Jugurtha, when 
he observed the corruption prevalent in Rome, predicted its 
early fall, gloomily prophesied a similar fate for us. But 
the United States, far from showing any signs of dissolution, 
have developed a vigor which has not only conquered the 
calumny of the critic, often more difficult to conquer than 
a kingdom, but has even, in some cases, turned the attacks 
of enemies into compliments so fulsome as to savor of ob- 
sequiousness. 

The feeling of a certain class of foreigners in this regard 
culminated on the outbreak of the Civil War, and wath a 
A''ery ill concealed air of triumph they pointed to that inter- 
necine strife as an evidence of their foresight and a fulfil- 
ment ot their prophecies. A marvellous amount of political 
wisdom and high moral feeling was developed in the most 
unexpected quarters during the period that followed, and 
while the issue of the contest w^as uncertain. Everyone in 
every bar-room and debating society three thousand miles 
away — the farther away, the better — had an opinion to offer 
about the United States, and most of the opinions were of 
an unfavorable, not to say an alarming, character. The 
country, it was gravely, sometimes triumphantly, alleged, 
by these political philosophers, ignorant alike of our insti- 
tutions and our national character, had no cohesive power ; 



CHANGED FOREIGN SENTIMENT. T 

it was ca mass of heterogeneous elements between M'hicli 
there was no natural affinity ; and it was solemnly declared 
by some that it was a political monster, whose abnormal size 
made it a menac ' "> the world, and that therefore Provi- 
dence had men .. ..liy interfered in the form of war, to re- 
strain its presumption and keep it within reasonable bounds. 

The feelings of the same class of persons, (many of whom, 
I regret to say, my dear Dean, were countrymen of yours), 
have happily changed since then, at least in profession, and 
I should be sorry to accuse them of hypocrisy. The doc- 
trine of "manifest destiny," a device of our ingenious 
civilization for subordinating the principles of morality to 
our own wishes, now much in vogue, has come to their aid, 
and they can now find a use for the United States, higher 
even than the exalted one of producing heiresses for the 
comfort and convenience of bankrupt European nobility. 

American progress, which at a time when, as you may 
remember, " our brethren across the seas " were more akin 
than kind, was characterized as an evidence of Amei-ican 
greed and an unholy and headlong hunt after riches, has 
been placed in quite a different position. So with other 
things American, from the building of a Brooklyn Bridge 
to the driving of a nail in the fence of a prairie farm, the 
character of our doings and belongings has been honored 
and exalted. Even your present Laureate has been good 
enough to notice us, and to sing of us as though he washed 
we were not so far away from the country he makes musical 
by his song, that he might show us how much he loves us 
— perhaps by reading to us every day the verses with which 
he charms the ear of royalty. 

This altered sentiment should of course be very agreeable 
to us, and, possibly, we would be better able to enjoy it, 
were our minds delivered of cei-tain disturbing thoughts in 
connection therewith. 

Dating, as it does, from a discovery recently made — cer- 



8 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

tainlj one of the most extraordinary ethnological phen- 
omena on record — that the population of the United States 
which, directly or indirectly, represents in point of nation- 
ality, half the peoples of the earth, is actually " an Anglo- 
Saxon community," the mental struggle over the mysterious 
change of opinion alluded to, seriously interferes with our 
enjoyment. 

But, discharging our minds for a moment of this diffi- 
culty, let us not forget that our national character has risen, 
and that our peculiarities as a people are no longer the sub- 
ject of ridicule or condemnation. For instance, American 
progress, according to the new opinion, no longer represents 
" American greed," or the thing sneered at as " American 
smartness," or that still more objectionable thing termed 
" American push " ; these things now illustrate, and, in 
fact, all things worth talking of in tlie United States now 
illustrate, the " vigor of the Anglo-Saxon race," and have, 
therefore, served the high purpose of paying a compliment 
to the greatness of Englishmen themselves. 

The " heterogeneous elements " formerly complained of, 
have been condescendingly recognized, it having been, by 
a kind of Special Providence, discovered that they belong 
also to the same favored family. 

The proverbial facility and complacency with which 
Englishmen can appropriate the virtues of other countries, 
almost convince one that the Apostle had England pro- 
phetically in mind when he said, in one of his epistles to a 
body of fellow Christians: " All things are yours." 

Know ing as I do that you have made a special study of 
civil laws and the growth of municipal institutions in the 
Old World, I shall endeavor to enlighten you frankly on 
the merits and defects disclosed during our own rapid 
development along these lines. As I shall endeavor to 
demonstrate in subsequent letters that the fate of the Tweed 
Ring furnished a crucial test of our capacity for self- 



MYSTERIES OF MUNICIPAL AFFAIRS. 9 

government when crowded into a gigantic modern city, 
with large and diverse foreign elements to be educated and 
assimilated, it will be necessary for me to devote consider- 
able space to a fair presentation of the rise and demolition 
of that Ring, and shall acquaint you with many facts not 
generally known to-day, even in this city of ours, which 
was the garden of the Tweed Ring — and which has not yet 
ceased to yield bounteous harvests to modern scientific 
political farmers and foragers who avoid the crude, coarse 
methods of the early pillagers ! 



LETTER 11. 

English Prestige in Europe— How Affected by Ameri- 
can Independence— The Boasted British Constitution 
—Fundamental Difference Between It and the Con- 
stitution OF the United States— How the Latter is 
Venerated by American Citizens— Unrestrained Au- 
thority OF the British Parliament— The Blessings and 
Dangers of Liberty. 

My dear Dean : 

Owing to the many and virulent attacks which have been 
made, from time to time, by foreign writers of the class 
referred to in the preceding letter, upon American institu- 
tions, as long as there was any hope of destroying or dis- 
crediting them, and in reply to some observations and in- 
quiries of your own, you will not think it out of place for 
me to say a word in relation to the nature and foundation 
of our American Government. The strictures just re- 
ferred to were, after all, from an English standpoint, not 
unreasonable, for it must be remembered that America gave 
the first serious blow to English prestige in Europe, and it 
was long before she recovered from this wound to her 
vanity and reputation. 

America was her most formidable rival in trade (a deity 
that Britons fervidly adore) and a greater rival still, in giv- 
ing substance and life to principles of government of which 
England was long supposed to have the monopoly. After 
the fall of the First Napoleon, Great Britain was practically 
supreme, not only in Europe, but tliroughout the world — 
everywhere except in America. Here her power was 
obliged to halt. The free Republic was the sole formid- 
able barrier to her scheme of universal empire, and although 
defeat to the arms of a nation is always a bitter memory to 
her people, many English statesmen now assert; and I should 

10 



AMERICAN AND BRITISH CONSTITUTIONS. 11 

say, correctly assert, that it was a blessing in disguise for 
England to have failed in lier wild schemes, from first to last, 
against American liberty; that it was good for the world, good 
especially for England herself ; and if there be something 
of the spirit of the imprisoned Uriah Heep in their re 
joicings over her defeat, we can make allowances for the 
sense of self respect which, under the guise of a righteous 
submission to the decrees of Providence, or the shield of a 
large philanthropy, would seek to hide her humiliation. 

There is no expression to be found more frequently in 
the mouths of Englishmen, in their platform or other such 
performances, than " Our Glorious Constitution." You 
will not for a moment imagine that 1 wish to quarrel with 
the expression. Englishmen have a perfect right to use it 
if they please, and I can easily excuse them for being 
unusually proud of a system under which unusually great 
things have been done and uncommonly great men have 
lived. Besides, my only object in referring to it at all is for 
the purpose of comparison with another and, as I believe, a 
still more glorious Constitution. 

The British Constitution, however, of whose merits so 
much has been said and sung, and which is an inexhaustible 
subject of British eulogy, has no actual or tangible exist- 
ence. It is, in fact, a fiction, like so many things in the 
English legal system, and although certain measures, such 
as Magna Cbarta, the Petition of Eights and the Bill of 
Rights, are usually referred to under that name, it is as 
incorrect, from an American stand-point, to speak of them 
as a Constitution, as it would be to speak of tlie bricks of 
which it may be intended to build a house, as the house 
itself. Important as these measures may be, they lack the 
elements of permanence and unity, which, properly speak- 
ing, are involved in the very idea of a Constitution. They 
are, at best, but the disjecta membra of legislation, which 
Parliament in its desultoiy operations created and Avhich 



13 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Parliament, in its omnipotence, may at any time alter or 
unceremoniously repeal. It is in the very nature of a Con- 
stitution that it shall form the basis of legislation, control 
the whims and limit tlie action of the legislator. Other- 
wise than sentimentally, the measures enumerated have no 
such effect. 

The accuracy of the foregoing remarks is made abund- 
antly evident by a glance at the United States, which have, 
as you are aware, a written Constitution, and where the 
idea of the omnipotence of Congress has no existence as 
the idea of the omnipotence of Parliament has in England. 
Congress is the subject and not the superior of the Consti- 
tution ; the omnipotence of the legislature is a purely 
English idea, and the one, above all others, which dis- 
tinguishes in character and scope of authority the Parlia- 
ment of Great Britain from the Congress of the United 
States. 

The possession of a written Constitution is a safeguard 
which, perhaps, more than any other, will secure the per- 
manence of the Republic, and protect it from the only real 
danger it may yet have to fear. Against foreign enemies 
it is no boast to say that, both by position and extent of re- 
sources, it is invincible. Against internal ambition our 
written Constitution provides an effectual shield. It is no 
shifting or uncertain element. It stands firm, massive and 
prominent, towering aloft, and visible in the most remote 
corner, as in the centre, of the land. 

There is nothing ambiguous about its utterances. The 
insolent hand of the political marauder cannot be raised 
against it or laid upon it under the pretext that he does not 
understand its provisions. Against all such assailants it 
stands as a warning and a guide, proclaiming, with a 
majesty peculiarly its own, "Thus far shalt thou go and no 
further." 

It is a more effectual check upon the rashness of Legisla- 



SAFEGUARDS OF THE REPUBLIC. 13 

tion and the schemes of the politician tlian any kind of 
Parliamentary machinery ever devised. The latter, the 
expert and ingenious operator can, one way or other, work 
to his purpose, but in the presence of the calm, majestic 
dignity of the Constitution of the United States, he is awed 
into silence, and his schemes against the welfare of the 
Commonwealth shrink as though before a power which he 
is bound instinctively to obey. 

Another safeguard of the Republic is the distinct indi- 
viduality of its several States and the union of all. Each, 
within its own boundaries and within the sphere of its local 
affairs, is practically supreme. Each is a separate and living 
political unit, while all are combined under a common head 
by the golden links of liberty and law. 

The national motto, E Plurihus Urmra, appropriately 
indicates the nature of that social and political composition 
of the Republic, which, while one of the guarantees of 
freedom and of its national existence, is also the chief 
source of its dignity and power. In face of the fate which 
has befallen the greatest Empires, it might seem presump- 
tuous to speak of the possible perpetuity of anything of 
human origin. So far, however, as one may be permitted 
to predict such a destiny for any nation, we may do so for 
the United States. Nor is this altogether unreasonable. It 
differs essentially and fundamentally from every country 
which has preceded it. It is founded upon principles 
which, until it arose, the world had never seen applied, and 
which, even yet, much of the world fails to appreciate or 
fully understand. The government of the people, by the 
people, and for the people, was a startling novelty in days 
when the narrowest doctrines ruled in politics and the 
reason of the better half of mankind was enchained by 
traditions of ancient tyranny and privilege. From time 
immemorial the earth had been filled with serfs and syco- 
phants and with despots who, under one form or another, 



14 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

liad preyed upon their fellow creatures without mercy and 
without remorse. Half-dazed with suffering, the mass of 
mankind Lore their ills in silence, looking in vain, or grop- 
ing l)lindly, for a savior. 

Amidst such conditions the United States arose, a miracle 
among the nations, a rebuke to tyranny for all time, a vindi- 
cation of the rights of man as taught by Christ and His 
Apostles, and a warning to the selfishness of rulers through- 
out the world. From what depths mankind was lifted 
by the rise of the United States, can be seen on a perusal of 
the Declaration of Independence. How the great ones of 
the earth must have been surprised to hear tliat all men 
were created equal ; how the spirit of the slave must have 
leaped within him, when he heard prockimed, for the first 
time, the sacred right of resistance to tyranny ; and with 
what indignation the pride of the social and political monop- 
olist must have learned that the poorest of his brethren was 
as entitled, as he was, to " life, liberty and the pursuit of 
happiness." No doubt, there was a lifting up of many 
hands in horror, the raising of many supercilious eyebrows 
in contempt of these pretensions of the vulgar, and much 
w^agging of sage and pious heads over the profanity and in- 
novations of these latter days. 

In the history of human liberty, that immortal document 
shines with a light which no lapse of time can obscure or 
diminish. It is as truly a synopsis of the Gospel of Free- 
dom as the Sermon on the Mount is of the duties of man 
to man. While it is remembered, there is little fear of any 
long-continued triumph of tyranny or corruption. Its in- 
fluence will never die. More than one hundred years have 
passed since it appeared, and it is still read with a fervor, 
and greeted with an enthusiasm, as striking as that which 
thrilled those who listened to the ennobling sentiments 
it embodies, on the first day of its publication. A knowl- 
edge of it is a part of the education of every child in our 



FOUNDATION PRINCIPLES OF OUR GOVERNMENT. 15 

public schools, and its teachings, like the prayers one learns 
at a mother's knee, become, and remain, interwoven with 
the highest and holiest part of the nature of the American 
man and woman, through every vicissitude of life. On the 
Fourth of July and other national anniversaries, it is read as 
an indispensable and leading part of the ceremonial of the 
day. This frequent renewal of early national inspirations 
keeps ever strong and fresh in the American mind the spirit 
which animated the Fathers of the Republic. It is a rep- 
etition of the story of the giant Antseus in his struggle 
with Hercules, and an illustration of the moral it contains. 
Brought into repeated contact with the teachings and 
glorious traditions of the past, the patriotism of the people 
is invigorated and renewed, as the strength of the exhausted 
Antseus in his fight was revived every time he fell upon the 
bosom of his mother earth, in a way that enabled him to re- 
sume the contest with fresh vigor, invincible while thus 
permitted to touch the source of his life and strength, but 
vanquished only when held in mid-air by his antagonist ; 
so it will only be when the minds of the American people 
are withdrawn from the frequent contemplation of the prin- 
ciples which are the foundation as well as the pillars of the 
Republic, that it will ever incur the danger of overthrow 
or decay. 

Upon the principles enunciated in the Declaration of 
Independence, the Constitution of the United States is 
founded. The spirit of these principles permeates every 
one of its provisions, and shines through them as the elec- 
tric light shines through the crystal of the globe that sur- 
rounds it. In the Constitution the divine voice has received 
a permanent embodiment and expression, and the Goddess 
of national enthusiasm a noble and abiding temple. 

As the words of the Declaration, no matter how often 
proclaimed, never fail to appeal to the hearts of its hearers, 
so the Constitution, under all circumstances, receives the 



16 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

homage and respect— one might say, the reverence— of the 
American people. A man's fortune may fade and fall 
away, but his feelings for the great palladium of his coun- 
try's liberties lose nothing of their intensity. No wonder ; 
like the Great Dome of Heaven it bends over all, and em- 
braces with its over-arching majesty every citizen of the 
Republic, without distinction. Be he rich or poor, for- 
tunate or the reverse, it shelters all alike, and protects with 
its glittering segis every member of the community in the 
exercise of his natural rights. But it does more, for it not 
only protects, but it unites the»diverse elements of the com- 
munity, by presenting to all one common object of worship 
and affection. Yet it can be altered or added to, for the 
conditions of progress require that alteration and amend- 
ment must be made, from time to time, in the best of things. 
A rigid and immoveable conservatism means early stag- 
nation and ultimate decay. But our organic law can only 
be altered in the spirit in which it was conceived, and in 
pursuance of the policy for which it was originally insti- 
tuted. Nor can any alteration, however trifling or how- 
ever much required, be made without following a circuitous 
and well-defined course, by which the wish of the people 
can be distinctly ascertained, and their will implicitly 
obeyed. 

Before any amendment to the Constitution can be passed, 
a proposal for the same must be made by two-thirds of both 
Houses of Congress, or in a convention called for the pur- 
pose on the application of the Legislatures of two-thirds of 
the States, and the proposed amendments become valid only 
when ratified by the Legislatures of three-fonrths of the 
several States, or by conventions in three-fourths thereof, 
as one or other mode of ratification may be proposed by 
Congress. Fifteen amendments, or rather additions, have 
been made to the Constitution since its adoption in 1Y87, 



FUNDAMENTAL DIFFERENCES IN ORGANIC LAW. 17 

which, it may be observed, are all on the lines of the orig- 
inal instrument and are but expansions of its principles. 

I have dwelt upon this topic thus far, for the purpose of 
illustrating the fundamental differences between the Con- 
stitution of Great Britain and that of the United States, 
and the manner in which they are regarded in each country 
respectively. The one is a group of well finislied but 
loosely connected materials, the other a solid and 'stately 
structure. "While, to the American mind, it seems almost 
criminal to interfere with any rule which the Constitution 
has laid down, or any right which it guarantees, under the 
English Government the most sacred rights of the people, 
even the Act which guarantees them a speedy trial and 
freedom from imprisonment, may be set aside with no 
more ceremony than is required to pass an ordinary bill, 
and, as you are aware, have been so set aside in England 
within the present century, and, in very recent times, in 
one part of the United Kingdom, in manner more summary 
than that usually observed in passing a common railway 
act or settling a cpiestiou of supply. 

The arrest and imprisonment of the subject, without 
warrant, or without warrant of a constitutional character, 
have been sanctioned with a lightness, and even hilarity, 
which might almost incline one to believe that the whole 
proceeding was intended for the promotion of official 
amusement. 

With a system like that of the United States, written, 
fixed and definite, such rash legislation in matters so vitally 
important would be absolutely impossible. The " genius of 
the Constitution," which Lord Chatham so fervently invoked 
for the purpose of restraining the inconsiderate passions of 
his time, would not have been appealed to without effect, 
had there been a fundamental structure to restrain the 
rashness of Parliament. But there were no lines to limit 



18 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the omnipotence of England's Lords and Commons, an 
omnipotence which at once confers upon them great dignity 
and exposes them to great danger ; there was nothing tliat 
distinctly represented or embodied the genius of the Consti- 
tution, which could be tangibly or directly appealed to ; the 
goddess was only a poetic fancy ; the expression an alluring 
figure of speech, which lost its poetry and its force when 
the orator resumed his seat. 

But you may naturally ask, how, under such a system as 
ours, where all that is best in man may attain the highest 
perfection of which he is capable, can such enormous evils 
arise which, even ourselves frankly admit, exist in certain 
localities ? 

The reason is not far off. Besides the fact that we have 
to deal with a composite population, it is not to be ex- 
pected that men whose immediate ancestors scarcely even 
heard the name of liberty, as we understand it, could enter 
into the enjoyment of it with the calmness and modera- 
tion of hereditary freemen. Liberty, while a great bless- 
ing, may be also a great danger. Evil and good seem 
destined to walk side by side forever in this mysterious 
world of ours, and the greater the good, the greater some- 
times appears the influence of its dark companion. The 
powers of darkness exact a tribute from the powers of light, 
which the latter are bound in some form or other to pay. 
Liberty is like the sun, and as the same sun which in its 
strength brings forth the most luscious fruits and the bright 
luxuriance of flowers, nurtures also the poisonous plant, so 
liberty, in the fields of human advancement, not only de- 
velops, in the highest degree, the noblest forms of virtue, 
but also some of the worst forms of evil. That it may have 
done so here, in some respects, I am not going to deny. 
But the human weeds, inseparable from the present condi- 
tion of our society, will gradually disappear under the 



Purpose of these letters. 19 

progress of intelligence and higher ideas of morality, which 
true liberty is sure to disseminate. 

Our purpose, however, is to take a look at the past, and 
this I shall begin to do in my next letter. 



LETTER III. 

Mysteries of Municipal Affairs — Far Eeaching "Pulls" 
OF A Hidden Power — A Subservient and Corrupt Judi- 
ciary — How Judges Were Seduced From the Paths of 
Rectitude — Apparent Invincibility of the Boss and 
His Adherents — His Grasping Propensities — New 
Phase of an Old Evil— The Peril Which Confronts 
Our Citizens To-day. 

My dear Dean : 

From the tone and scope of mj last letter, you may be 
led to believe that I am such an absolute idolater of Amer- 
ican Institutions as to be no more able to see in them a 
blemish or defect than the lover can in the person of the 
lady he adores, or that if I did see any, my admiration of 
the governmental fabric as a whole would render me in- 
capable of writing anything which might tend to lower the 
dignity or detract from the beauty of the idol. My object, 
however, is not to idealize American Institutions or to 
crown them with any laurels to which they are not fairly 
entitled. It is simply to chronicle what I have seen and 
known of political methods for the last thirty years in the 
City of New York, and in doing so faithfully I shall be 
obliged to say many things far from flattering. For mani- 
fest reasons the names of the characters introduced wall be 
in some instances fictitious, but they themselves will be 
sufficently described to make their identity easy of recog- 
nition by any one who may have followed the history of 
the City during the period of which I write. The characters 
introduced will truly and fairly represent their prototypes. 
No misrepresentations shall mar the truth. No picture of 
New York political life or of the characters of those who 
figured in it shall be overdrawn. No situation, be it gro- 

20 ■ . K 



SOCIAL AND POLITICAL DISTURBANCES. 21 

tesque or normal, shall be exaggerated. True it is, I would 
fain be delighted that everything of political life, from the 
highest functions of the government down to the doings of 
the ward politician in a city, should be in accord with the 
principles enunciated and the hopes inspired by the funda- 
mental instrument on which and through which the whole 
machinery has been set in motion. 

But the history of the races of the earth shows that, no 
matter how splendid or noble the character and object of 
schemes of government have been, however high the 
motives of its authors or earnest their desire to accomplish 
the greatest good to the greatest number, in the practical 
operation of its details they have in numerous instances 
been but so many instruments to serve the purposes of the 
corrupt and vicious. The people of every enlightened 
community in their aggregate capacity are, as a general 
proposition, honest. Hence the social and political disturb- 
ances arising from discontent with the corrupt few, ending 
ultimately in violent revolutions and bloodshed, which 
have characterized the history of almost every country 
ancient and modern. Even under the highest form of 
human government as it appears in the United States of 
America, whose foundations are laid on a basis of the 
broadest benevolence and humanity, corruption in the 
avenues of local administration, especially in cities, has had, 
and unfortunately is now having, its corroding effects in 
the body politic. 

Within the period of which I am about to write, it is my 
pride and privilege to be able to assert, that the City of 
New York has experienced an evolution which, although 
by no means satisfactory or complete, is yet a step towards 
the attainment of honesty and capacity in the conduct of 
municipal government. It is because there is stili much 
room for improvement, and because I believe the imj^rove- 
ment can be easily effected when the necessity for it 



23 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

becomes sufficiently known, that in these letters I desire to 
laj bare the abuses from which we have suffered and to a 
great extent are still suffering. 

The public at large know but little of the under-currents 
which control our municipal affairs, or those subtle methods 
and practices which continually steal, without the public's 
knowledge or observation, the safe-guards of their liberty 
and the essential elements of their prosperity. It is safe 
to say that there are scarcely five thousand persons in New 
York City, out of its three-and-a-half millions of popula- 
tion, who not only have not a full, but who have not even 
a faint, idea of the insidious character of the political 
methods which control their local affairs and interests, the 
secret channels of influence, and the devious paths leading 
to a hidden power wliicli in effect is as potent as that of a 
despotic monarch. 

Yet the popvilation of New York shows an exceptional 
intelligence in its treatment of public questions, and is 
versed in public affairs to an extent which surpasses that of 
the average inhabitant of any other city in the world. 
This superior intelligence is, I believe, the result of that 
universal suffrage which gives every citizen a personal 
interest in the government, and in a closely crowded 
community, where people are frequently in the habit of 
meeting each other, leads to a vigorous interchange of 
views. The reading of newspapers is universal. It is not 
confined to any class or sex, or even to any age after twelve 
years. When an election is in sight the newspapers regard 
all other work in their columns as secondary to the flaming 
articles, pictures and caricatures, bearing on the issues 
involved in the coming contest. Women in every station 
of life are caught in the vortex of political excitement and 
enter with spirit — often wdtli asperity — into the arena of 
political controversy. No household, however peacefully 
inclined its inmates, is exempt from the possibility of 



SECRET COMBINATIONS AND CONSPIRACIES. 23 

becoming the theatre of lively disputes on the relative 
merits of candidates, the truth or falsity of the torrent of 
accusation, vilification and slander with which, according 
to custom, the character, private and public, of the repre- 
sentatives of the contending parties is at such times assailed. 

In view of the statement that there are scarcely five 
tliousand persons in the City of New York who are aware 
of the secret and surreptitious methods governing the " in- 
side " of politics, or of the subterranean channels through 
which gross wrongs are perpetrated, this claim to superior 
intelligence on the part of the people of New York may 
seem paradoxical. Eut it is easy of explanation. The gen- 
eral discussion is on subjects which are open and above 
board. The secret combinations, conspiracies, "deals,"' 
and bribery are confined to the expert politician. The 
combinations are so involved and intricate that it requires 
long experience and sometimes unusual sagacity to probe 
the depths of the schemes. 

The purpose of this and succeeding letters will be to 
reveal to you the truth concerning them, and lay bare the 
facts in all their naked repulsiveness, with the object of 
giving you a full view of our political situation, and in the 
faint hope that, should these disclosures ever meet the pub- 
lic eye, similar practices may be foiled in future. 

In thinking of these schemes and their effects, one can 
hardly say whether he feels more of anger or humiliation. 
Among the various grades of evil, perhaps the most serious 
and melancholy of the results arising from the work of the 
professional politicians has been that affecting the Judi- 
ciary. It is difficult to conceive the possibility of a subser- 
vient and corrupt Judiciary in an enlightened community. 
To be made the arbiter of the differences between man and 
man, to be elected by a confiding people to deal out even- 
handed justice, to be sworn to enforce the law, to be paid a 
liberal stipend from the pockets of the people to perform that 



24 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

service witli impartiality — these are conditions which should 
appeal to the honor, the manhood and whatever there is of 
good in the human mind and heart. 

The functions of a Judge approach more nearly our con- 
ception of Divine Justice than those of any other position 
on earth. To basely betray that trust is an act bordering 
on sacrilege. To wrongfully take the property of one man 
and confer it upon another by the machinery of the law 
and the wilful employment of juridical chicanery, for a 
bribe, or for favoritism, or for hope of reward from the 
person benefited, or for the purpose of procuring political 
advantage, or in recognition of political favors received or 
to be received, or for any purpose on earth, stamps the 
Judge who is guilty of such treason and infamy as the worst 
of all criminals. He embodies in his own person at once 
the character of a betrayer of a sacred trust, a callous pur- 
loiner of private property, and a perjurer of the blackest 
dye ; and all these things have been done. Some who have 
been on the Bench have laid the flattering unction to their 
souls, that their secret liaisons with unscrupulous political 
libertines, who audaciously defiled the Temple of Justice, 
were undiscovered and unknown ; but these pages will dis- 
close facts showing that Judges who lend themselves to 
schemes of politicians will not escape retribution. How 
lawyers of supposed sagacity, derived from experience at 
the bar, long or short as the case may be, (in New York, 
generally short) who reached the Bench, should have de- 
luded themselves with the belief that they could entirely 
hide their tergiversations, is a matter of increasing wonder. 
But they ought to have known what the history of our 
Judiciary proves, that the politician who was able by his 
previous association with a Judge — that is to say, his inti- 
mate political acquaintance with him before he became 
Judge, which relation resulted in that Judge's elevation to 
the Bench — would some time or other boast of a triumph 



PRETENSION AND ASSUMPTION OF POLITICIANS. 25 

in seducing liini from the paths of rectitude, even as some 
miscreants, inflated with vanity, boast of tlieir conquests 
over female simplicity and weakness. In such case, at first 
he is cautious and confides it only to his closest friends. 
Each of the "closest friends" in turn, to show his own im- 
portance, tells his "closest friends" of the transaction. 
After being whispered about among a coterie of " closest 
friends," it becomes well-known that this particular poli- 
tician " owns " a certain Judge and can get him " to do 
anything." This brings vast importance to the politician 
aforesaid. Of course, he never openly states that he has 
this extraordinary power in the Courts, but by significant 
glances and in some cases by a knowing wink, he impliedly 
pleads guilty to the soft impeachment. During all this 
time, the miserable creature who is robed in judicial honors 
reposes in perfect ignorance of the ignominy which his acts 
of dishonor are bringing on his name. This has been the 
fate of many a Judge. 

But I must not anticipate the subject matter of subse- 
quent letters. In this communication, I shall merely fore- 
shadow the errors of our municipal government of the past 
and present, and leave my illustrations by actual occurrences 
for future letters. Meantime, I desire to point out some 
false theories concerning the source of such errors. 

Many foreign writers, who believe nothing good can 
come out of Nazareth, point to the corruption in public 
j)laces prevalent in the City of I^ew York as an evidence of 
national depravity, and dwell particularly on the disclosures 
under the Tweed regime as terrible examples. They speak 
of them more in sorrow than in anger, as it were, and, in a 
spirit of subdued regret at such manifestations of moral 
turpitude, plainly insinuate, if they do not openly assert, that 
all this has its origin in Universal Suffrage, which admits the 
ignorant and the vicious, especially foreigners, to the privi- 
lege of the ballot. While avowing a toplofty approval of 



^ THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

" American Institutions," there is in tlieir utterances an 
occult insinuation that the entire fabric of government is 
open to the most serious objections. None of these critics 
places the matter in the true light. 

It is conceded that in New York City great public crimes 
have been perpetrated, especially under the domination of 
Tweed and his confederates. But look at the conditions 
for a moment. Tweed and his coadjutors had nestled them- 
selves in the very vitals of the municipal government. 
They controlled (as it is termed here, " owned ") the Judges 
on the Bench, or at all events a working majority of them ; 
they owned the District Attorney of the County ; they 
owned the Grand Jury, which body was selected by their 
creatures ; they owned the Counsel to the Corporation ; they 
owned the members of the Common Council ; they owned 
the financial officer of the City; they owned not only all the 
heads of the various Departments, but the Police Commis- 
sioners, who had charge of the ballots cast at elections and 
who permitted the returns to be manipulated as suited their 
purpose ; they owned the Board of Supervisors, who finally 
counted the returns ; they owned even the Mayor ; they 
owned everything, in sight and out of sight, in the way of 
public functions and public functionaries ; they held a 
citadel copper-bound and copper-fastened, all welded to- 
gether by the " cohesive power of public plunder," which 
made them and their retainers co-partners in the crimes 
committed and to be committed. 

Yet that gigantic and apparently impregnable combina- 
tion was shattered into a thousand fragments, and the con- 
spirators (such of them as were not imprisoned) scattered as 
refugees from Justice to almost every quarter of the globe ; 
and all this was accomplished without any other instrument 
than the inherent and latent power which has its foundation 
in Universal Suffrage. Not a drop of blood was shed, not 
a soldier was called to arms, not a policeman's baton was 



TRIUMPH OF LAW AND ORDER. 27 

employed, not a violent blow was struck, nor scarcely an 
angry word nttered, but soberly and orderly, New York 
woke up to its duty and authority under the law, the 
machinery of Justice was set in motion with dignity and 
effect, and the People, stimulated by the Press, with the 
ballots in their hands, seconded the movement led by a few 
public-spirited citizens who, casting aside for a while their 
every-day avocations, espoused the cause of pure govern- 
ment. 

At first the task seemed hopeless, but the moral senti- 
ment of the community gradually bestirred itself, and, 
although the fight was a desperate one, the unwavering 
courage and abiding confidence of the honest citizens 
triumphed, and Law and Justice were vindicated. If, there- 
fore, the causes of these public plunders are traceable, as 
erroneously claimed by some writers, to the abuses under 
Universal Suffrage, it cannot be denied that by virtue of 
that same Universal Suffrage the ship was righted, and 
without bloodshed or even disorder restored to its original 
position. 

"Where in the history of the world, outside of America, 
was such massive and cohesive power broken without going 
through scenes of turbulence and carnage ? Where is re- 
corded such another triumph of law and order, without 
having recourse to anything but the machinery of civil 
authority ? No higher tribute can be paid to the genius of 
our institutions than the facts revealed in the story of that 
peaceful revolution. The magnitude of the resources at the 
command of the public plunderers, and the power behind 
and within which they were ensconced, but show more 
clearly the remedial and irresistible virtue that resides in 
the laws which afterwards made them felons and outcasts. 

Similar epidemics of corruption have appeared in other 
cities of the world, where no Universal Suffrage existed, 
and that in itself is a complete answer to the charge that 



28 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the priniarj cause of corruption in New York lay in tlie 
fact that the ballot Avas in the hands of every citizen. Tlie 
difference between the case of New York and that of such 
other cities is : while our experience shows there is no charm 
in Universal Suffrage to sav^e society from the possibility of 
corruption, it also shows there is a restorative and healing 
power in the ballot which can peacefully effect the cure ; 
but, in cities where Universal Suffrage does not exist, a 
remedy can only be perfectly achieved by the bullet or 
some such other clumsy method of official violence. 

I do not by these observations pretend to claim that the 
upheaval in New York, in the days of Tweed, and the terri- 
ble lessons it taught to dishonest public servants, forever 
remedied the evils of our municipal government. It did 
effectually cure that particular form of disease with which 
the Tweed Ring was identified, but it did not prevent the 
evolution of another phase of the same evil, in our body 
politic, of at least as dangerous a character. 

Indeed, as a moral and theological question, it might be 
difficult to determine which of the two systems of j)ecula- 
tion is the m.ore abhorrent, — that of Tweed and his con- 
federates, who stole by boldly altering the City accounts, 
whereby millions of dollars at a clip were feloniously ex- 
tracted from the Treasury, or that of the modern operator 
who lets the Treasury alone, so far as any direct assault 
upon it is concerned, but who, by the power vested in him 
as Boss, is able to steal from the pockets of the people by 
indirect methods ; by a process of magnificent blackmail to 
which not only the evil-doers, who pay for protection to 
their nefarious calling, are subject, but of which the pros- 
perous merchants and the mighty corporations are victims. 
"Whatever may be the degree of moral depravity of the re- 
spective systems, the result is the same to the people, 
because the ill-got gains in each case come out of their 
Dockets. 



TWO SYSTEMS OF EXACTING TRIBUTE. 20 

Of course, the Tweed system was the more vulgar, more 
coarse, and less ingenious. It had not in it the tinge of 
"business," the finesse, the smoothness of our modern 
system. But, after all, was it not the less dangerous ? The 
one was to a certain extent open, tangible and capable of 
being determined, and consequently the more easy of detec- 
tion. The other is devious, secret and insidious, under 
which the tribute or hush-money from the hands of thou- 
sands of interested victims or dependants passes into the 
capacious pockets of the man in power, like an indefinite 
number of rivulets starting from various sources, yet all 
flowing ceaselessly into one common and hidden pool. 



LETTER lY. 

How Absolute Power of the Ring Was Acquired— Origin 

OP THE TaBIMANY SOCIETY — ItS IMPORTANCE IN THE EaRLY 

Days op the Republic — Its Seizure by Tweed and His 
Associates to Promote Their Supremacy^The Source 
and Explanation op One-Man Power in the Democratic 
Organization— The Primary Election Farce— Wheels 
Within Wheels — Political Patronage and the Uses 
Made op It. 

My dear Dean : 

I remember tliat, during my visit to your home, you 
interrogated me particularly and closely, as to how, in a 
City where manhood suffrage prevails and popular sover- 
eignty exists in its broadest sense, one-man power in politics 
could be attained ; and how the absolute control of political 
power and patronage, in a City then of nearly one million 
of inhabitants, became centered in one man, called Boss 
or at any rate in three or four men ; and, moreover, how 
this power could continue for any length of time, especially 
when there existed a deep-seated suspicion, amounting to 
almost positive conviction, in the public mind, that those in 
authority were seething in corruption and purloining moneys 
from the public Treasury. 

Reflecting on this subject, I must admit it is not strange 
that such a condition of affairs was inexplicable to you, for, 
indeed, to the generality of ]^ew Yorkers, of that date, it 
was also inexplicable. Even now, the process whereby that 
absolute power was acquired and maintained, is known to 
comparatively few of our citizens. Yet the power to pre- 
vent it rested with the citizens themselves, just as it was 
proven that the power to break and destroy it rested with 
them. The citizens never took determined action until 

30 



THE BOSS IN POLITICS. 31 

tliey wei'e made fully alive to the nia,o:nitude and iuiquity 
of the public plunders which degraded, despoiled, and 
nearly bankrupted their city. 

It was while tlie Tweed Ring was in the height of its 
power that the term Boss was applied to the man who had 
control of the dominant political organization of the city ; 
who, by reason of his power, almost autocratic, was able to 
dispense political favors and patronage to his followers ; 
who was able to make nominations for elective positions, 
through the instrumentality of conventions, which were 
supposed to represent the popular sentiment and to have 
been the creation of a popular vote, by what were known 
as primary elections, but in reality were convened and con- 
trolled by this one man. 

The term Boss, however, did not have its origin in New 
York, nor was it primarily applied to a politician. The 
name was first used to designate a person who employed a 
number of men to perform manual labor, such as those en- 
gaged in building a railroad. It was applied also to a 
superintendent of any great work, where a large force of 
men was employed, and who could discharge or retain such 
of them as he saw fit. In the course of time the application 
was extended to almost any employer of lal)or, and expressed 
the same idea as Master does in your country. The phrase 
Master and Servant is unknown in this country, except in 
the Courts of law, where the expression is used in a mere 
technical sense, to designate the respective rights and obli- 
gations of employer and employee. But no employee in 
this country, while he may and does refer to his employer 
as Boss, will ever think of designating him Master. And 
of course it follows that ho never describes himself as 
Servant, nor indeed will he allow any one to call him Ser- 
vant without repudiating it, in some form or other, as 
incompatible with his American citizenship. No one, no 
matter in what capacity he may be engaged, objects to say- 



32 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ing ' My Boss," or, " I have a good Boss," or, " I have a 
bad Boss," as the case may be, in referring to his employer. 

A Boss, therefore, is a person of station and importance 
in the minds of the ordinary individual, and the highest 
aspiration of any workman, be he employed on a railroad 
or in a factory, or any other establishment where a number 
of hands are engaged, is that some day lie may be made 
Boss, which would ordinarily mean a superintendent, fore- 
man, or other supervisor of the men and their work. In 
alluding to any one who is attempting to usurp authority, 
or give orders with unnecessary imperiousness, the expres- 
sion is often heard " He is playing Boss," or, " He is trying 
to Boss me." Illustrative of this anxiety to play the part 
of Boss, a story is told of a laborer who was engaged to 
shovel five tons of coal into a shute in front of a residence. 
He was to receive one dollar for the job. Forthwith he 
engaged two Italians to do the work, at a stipulated price 
of sixty cents each, making one dollar and twenty cents in 
all. While the Italians were shoveling the coal, he super- 
intended the work, walking up and down with great pomp, 
and giving directions, now and again, in loud and most 
peremptory tones. When he was asked to explain why 
he should thus lose twenty cents on the job, he answered : 
" Begobs, it's worth twinty cints to be Boss, any day," 

It is therefore easy to trace the application ©^f the term 
Boss to the political autocrat, although I believe that Tweed 
was the first politician to whom it fastened as a distinctive 
and permanent cognomen. And now I may proceed with 
my explanation of the source of one-man power. 

Tammany Hall's political prestige had its origin in the 
Tammany Society, a secret organization which is almost 
coeval with the State of New York. Soon after the first 
inauguration of Washington at New York City, in April, 
1789, William Mooney, an Irish-American, of fair educa- 
tion, strong natural talents and ardent devotion to the 



ORIGIN OF THE TAMMANY SOCIETY. 33 

American cause, being an advanced " Liberty Boy," inspired 
by the fervor created by that great event, was instrumental 
in organizing the Tammany Society, or Columbian Order, 
and on the 12th day of May of the same year lie was in- 
stalled as its first Grand Sachem. It began its career as a 
purely patriotic and benevolent organization, and one of its 
announced purposes was the diffusion of liberal principles 
and the "spread of the light of liberty." Another of its 
avowed objects was the extension of the elective franchise, 
which was then confined to citizens owning real estate. The 
Society of the Cincinnati, also a patriotic organization, had 
been in existence several years before, but it was regarded 
as exclusive in its character, and admission to it was sup- 
posed to be open only to those of aristocratic tendencies ; 
and although it was asserted, at the time, that the Tammany 
Society was started in opposition to it, there is no well- 
authenticated ground for this charge. 

Tammany Society derived its name from a noted Indian 
chief, named Tamanend, who, from all accounts, was a person 
of great parts. While, it is said, he was a bold and sapient , 
leader in times of war, he won undying renown by his wis- 
dom, his peace-loving disposition and his skillful diplomacy. 
In behalf of the tribes over which he ruled he negotiated a 
treaty with William Penn. After a most exemplary life, 
he died at the age of 107 years. On account of his pacific 
policy and great piety his memory became so endeared to 
the Pennsylvania troops, under Washington, at the close of 
the Revolutionary War, that, discarding St. George, their 
old patron Saint under English rule, they adopted " St. 
Tammany," and gave a great celebration in true Indian 
fashion, to signalize the event. That festival was unique. 
A great liberty pole was erected. The warriors, elaborately 
decorated with feathers and buck-tails, gathered about the 
pole amid imposing pomp and ceremony. From the huge 
wigwam, which was adorned as befitted the abode of a great 



34 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

chief, came forth the representative of St. Tammany, dressed 
in the most artistic Indian fashion. To the assembled mul- 
titude, composed of civilians as well as soldiers, he gave a 
" long talk " on tlie duty of the hour, dilating upon the vir- 
tues of courage, justice and freedom ; after which the war- 
riors danced and caroused far into the night. For many 
years this celebration was continued, not only in Pennsyl- 
vania, but throughout other parts of the country. 

The Tammany Society was not organized until some 
years after this event; but, when fully organized, in addi- 
tion to electing a presiding officer or " Grand Sachem," 
twelve other " sachems," making thirteen in all, were elected 
to represent the thirteen original States of the Union. And 
to carry out fully the American principles of its founders, 
as well as to show its contempt for those societies aping 
foreign manners, it adopted aboriginal forms and ceremonies, 
and divided the year into seasons of " blossoms," " fruits *' 
and " snows," and the seasons into " moons," and in issuing 
calls for its meetings quaintly stated the time as "• one hour 
after the setting of the sun." 

From the day o£ its organization the Society began ?iot 
only to increase in numbers, but to exercise a potent influ- 
ence in the politics of the City, State, and even in the 
country at large. 

Following the establishment of the new Republic, the 
wealthy Tories who had remained in New York City, and 
who had sympathized with the English during the war of 
the Revolution, were excluded from political preferment. 
At about the time of the first inauguration of Washington^ 
these disabilities were removed ; an action which created 
popular indignation and, it is said, was the primary cause of 
the organization of the new Society. This circunistance 
tended, as a matter of course, to increase the popularity and 
power of the Society. Moreover, its forms and usages, de- 
rived as they w^ere from Indian customs, invested it with 



OLD TIME POLITICAL STRUGGLES. 35 

a romantic interest, and the popular instinct gave it the 
character and credit of being the special champion of the 
common people. President "Washington himself, it is 
claimed, had recourse to the aid of the Society in 1790, 
in receiving and entertaining a delegation of the Creek 
Indians, with a view to forming a treaty with them. 

In those times the dominant political parties were Feder- 
alists and Republicans. The Federalists were supposed to 
be the conservative and aristocratic classes, as many persons 
are now in the habit of regarding the Republicans of to-day ; 
while the Republicans of that day were the rank and file of 
the people, whom we now recognize as belonging to the 
Democratic party. Hence the posters and advertisements 
of Tammany Hall to-day, announcing its choice of candi- 
dates for office, are headed, " Regular Democratic-Repub- 
lican Nominations " — while the posters of the Republican 
party read " Regular Republican JSTominations." 

While the Tammany Society exercised a potential influ- 
ence for many years in shaping party policies, the first 
evidence of its zealous partisan activity was manifested 
when Aaron Burr, through his personal acquaintance with 
Grand Sachem Mooney and others of its leaders, although 
not himself a member, led it in 1799 against the Federalists, 
in both the City and State, giving them a surprising defeat, 
and indirectly securing for Burr himself a nomination to 
the Vice-Presidency of the United States. 

Emboldened by his success at the polls, through the aid 
of the Tammany Society, Burr even attempted, by trick and 
device, to steal the nomination for the Presidency from 
Thomas Jefferson, whose Democratic principles and great 
renown as the author of The Declaration of Independence 
endeared him to the " Sons of Tammany." Burr's attempt 
cost him both prestige and power, and although the Society 
supported him for the Governorship of Kew York, it was 
but in a perfunctory manner, which enabled Alexander 



36 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Hamilton to secure his defeat. In the bitterness of his 
chagrin, Burr tieliberatelj provoked a duel with Hamilton, 
and slew him, remaining, ever after, a ruined and scorned 
man, until his miserable career was ended by death. 

The Tammany Society, which had now become in politics 
a most formidable force, obtained from the Legislature of 
the State, in 1805, a charter imder the name of the "Tam- 
many Society, or Columbian Order." The objects in the 
charter are defined to be, mainly, " for charitable and 
benevolent purposes." Under the scope of its charter it 
established (about 1807) a Museum of Natural History ; but 
this did not prove to be a success, and the great showman 
P. T. Barnum finally came into possession of it. Indeed, 
the establishment of the Museum was regarded as a mere 
side-show, for politics was the main-spring and life of the 
Society. It had its hands full about this time, in a bitter 
contest with De Witt Clinton, subsequently Governor of 
the State, and the originator and advocate of the great Erie 
Canal. The cause of the quarrel was that Clinton, at one 
time the Scribe of the Society, became displeased with it 
on account of its having permitted Burr to use it for his 
own selfish purposes. In this controversy with Clinton, 
President James Madison took a hand in favor of the 
Society, notwithstanding the fact that De "Witt's uncle, 
George Clinton, was then Yice-President. The Tammany 
Society obtained entire control of the Federal patronage in 
New York City, and at the same time one of its members, 
Daniel D. Tompkins, was Governor of the State. 

The first Tammany Wigwam was located in what was 
then known as " Martling's Long Room," corner of Nassau 
and Spruce streets, where the building of the leading 
Republican paper (the Tribune) now stands. The first 
regular Hall for the Society was built on the corner of 
Nassau and Frankfort streets, now the site of the New York 
Su7i newspaper. It was first occupied by the Tammany 



TAMMANY'S CAPTURE BY TOE TWEED RING. 37 

Society in 1812, and from that period tlie Democratic 
organization of this City, owing to its occupancy of the 
Hall of the Tammany Society, became identified witli it, 
and known as " Tammany Hall." 

I have referred briefly to the ancient history of tlie Tam- 
many Hall organization for the purpose of showing that it 
has some claims on the sentiment and support of the people, 
because of its ancient prestige and liberal policy, and that 
long ago, if it were not for this fact, the corruptions of 
which it has been the nurse, and which at times have 
stunned the public, would have resulted in its annihilation. 

Shortly after the close of the Civil War, when what is 
known as the " Tweed Ring " was being formed, it was 
found necessary by the members of that combination, in 
order to secure absolute control of the Democratic organiza- 
tion, and to promote their schemes, to capture the Tammany 
Society. At every annual election of that Society, as I have 
before stated, there are elected thirteen Sachems. Under 
the control of these Sachems is all the property of the So- 
ciety, including, of course, Tammany Hall. As no special 
interest was generally taken in those elections, it was an 
easy matter for the members of the Ring to elect — and they 
did elect — a majority of the thirteen Sachems, thus gaining 
control of the Society and of Tammany Hall. Once en- 
trenched in the citadel of Democracy of the City of New 
York, being in possession of all the power and fittings of 
the organization, it was an easy matter to hold the fort. 

The first step of the Ring, after securing ascendancy, was 
to sell the old building on Park Row, corner of Frankfort 
street, and erect a new edifice on Fourteenth street, the 
corner stone of which was laid on July 4th, 1867, and in 
one year from that date the Democratic National Conven- 
tion of 1868 there assembled and nominated Horatio Sey- 
mour for President of the United States — the first National 
Convention since 1860 at which delegates from all the 



38 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

States of the Union were present, tlie secession of the 
Southern States during the Civil War liaving temporarily 
disrupted the partj. 

A few words now about the organization of the Demo- 
cratic (or Tammany Hall) party as it existed in the days of 
Tweed. But, I may say, primarily, that in the State of New 
York we had then, as now, two distinct census-takings 
— one by the Federal government every ten years, or for 
example in 1870, 1880, 1890, 1900 ; while the State census 
is taken every intermediate fifth year, or in 1876, 1885, 
1895, and so on. After each census there is a new appor- 
tionment of representation based on the population as 
newly recorded. The Congressional districts, which of 
course determine the number of representatives from each 
State, are fixed by Congress. The Legislature, after a State 
census, divides the State into Judicial, Senatorial and 
Assembly Districts ; but the component parts of Assembly 
Districts where there is more than one in a county are fixed 
by the Board of Supervisors of such county. In the city of 
New York portions of the Wards are in different Assembly 
Districts, caused by the endeavor to equalize the popular 
representation in each Assembly District. For instance, in 
1868 there were twenty-two wards, but only twenty one 
Assembly Districts. Then the Bureau of Elections, the 
Police Commissioners, divided each Ward into Election 
Districts ; and the General Committee of Tammany Hall as 
well as that of the Republican party fixed the number of 
delegates to the respective General Committees to which 
each Ward was entitled, basing the representation upon the 
numbers of Democratic or Republican votes cast in each 
Ward at the last Gubernatorial election. This much I state 
to show you the basis of our American system of representa- 
tion. 

Every Ward of the city had a Ward Committee supposed 
to represent the Election Districts in the Ward, and the 



ORIGIN OF ONE MAN POWER. Sd 

combined Ward Committees formed the General Com- 
mittee of Tammany Hall for the city at large. In every 
Ward was a captain or leader, who might or might not have 
been the chairman of the Ward Committee. If the chair- 
man was not the leader, his functions were merely orna- 
mental, as the whole power was lodged in the leader or 
local Boss, who had been selected for the position by direc- 
tion of the Boss-in-chief. Then, besides this, in every 
Ward was an Election District Committee, consisting of 
delegates from the Election Districts into which the Ward 
was divided. This was not a very important body, except 
that it formed a scheme to extend connection with Tam- 
many Hall as far as possible among the people, and to 
furnish voters when in case of a contest they were needed 
at primary elections. It also conld, at short notice, supplj'- 
claquers or "shouters" at nominating conventions. This 
Election District Committee was absolutely controlled by 
the local leader, who named its chairman and other officers. 
A large majority of its members were mechanics and 
laborers employed on the various public works. These 
committees that I have described were only what may be 
termed the scattered power of the organization. 

I now come to consideration of the committee in Tam- 
many Hall in which was concentrated the one-man power. 
That was the Committee on Organization, or Executive 
Committee, composed of the twenty-two leaders of the 
twenty-two Wards respectively. This body was the ab- 
solute slave of the Boss-in-chief. Every member of it 
either held ofSce, elective or appointive, at the Boss's 
hands, or else was a favored contractor of public works, or 
was in some other position of political advantage. The 
Boss not only held every one of them responsible for his 
own vote and conduct, but for the vote and conduct of the 
members of his Ward Committee, and further, for the vote 
and conduct of every member of the Election District 



40 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Committee of his Ward. When I say conduct, of course 
you understand that I mean political conduct. So you see, 
the Boss in-chief held the whip-hand over every member of 
the General Committee as well as of the Ward and Elec- 
tion District Committees. 

But, you may inquire, how did all this control nom. 
inating conventions composed of delegates elected by the 
people ? I may answer, that I have shown you the com- 
ponent parts of the " machine," the wheels within wheels, 
and the lever on the inside. You must remember also that 
the great majority of the members of these committees 
were on the City pay-roll, or were interested in some way 
or other, politically or financially, in the success of the 
"machine," and that there were many sinecurists who 
performed no work except political work. Thus the " ma- 
chine" created conventions, set them in motion, and con- 
trolled them, as absolutely as the engineer who has a hold 
of the throttle of his engine controls not only the running 
of the engine, and of every car attached to it, but the 
destiny of the passenger inside, No one on the inside ob- 
jected to the great political engineer, or to the manner in 
which he ran the " machine," in this case ; for all hands 
were enjoying a pleasant and profitable time. 

]^ow, as to the management of the Primary Elections, 
and the calling and handling of conventions. In the first 
place, you must bear in mind that " regularity " was an es- 
sential element of Tammany's political power in those days, 
as well as at the present time. Wliat I mean by " reg- 
ularity " is, that the Democratic State Convention recog- 
nizes and accepts the delegates sent to that Convention by 
Tammany Hall as the regular representatives of the Dem- 
ocratic party in the City of New York. The method of 
maintaining regularity in all the districts, then as now, was 
as follows : 

The State Central Committee — a body elected annually 



OPERATING THE MACHINE. 41 

by tlie State Convention to perform all executive work 
during the year and until the next State Convention — 
issued a call for the holding of a State Convention, at a 
designated time and place, and requested the Democracy 
in every Assembly District to elect delegates to said Con- 
vention, stating the purpose for which the Convention was 
called. Thereupon the Chairman of the General Com- 
mittee of Tammany Hall got that Committee together, and 
after explaining the object of the meeting, some one, under 
instruction from headquarters, offered a resolution that 
Primary Elections be held in the various Wards to elect 
delegates to Assembly District Conventions, for the pur- 
pose of selecting delegates to the State Convention, in pur- 
suance of the "call" of the State Central Committee. 
This was all right and proper and entirely regular. The 
resolution was of course adopted. Then the presiding 
officer requested each Ward Committee to name three in- 
spectors to preside over the Primary in his Ward, which 
inspectors were named by the respective leaders. This 
was done, and also seemed fair on its face and entirely reg- 
ular. Here is where " popular sovereignty " was supposed 
to begin, but in reality where it ceased to exist. 

The call from the General Committee was published and 
the Primaries were held on the night named in the call. 
But, prior to that night, the leader of the Ward, whether 
he was chairman of the Ward Committee or not, and who 
had, as I have stated, chosen the inspectors, made out a list 
of delegates to be voted for at the Primaries. Of course he 
named only men on whom he could rely. Then he sent 
for the three inspectors of the Primary, who were supposed 
to receive and count the ballots, but were his creatures, and 
he had them sign a certificate, that the persons named on 
the ballot prepared by himself had been duly elected dele- 
gates to the Assembly District Convention. All this, it 
will be observed, was in advance of the Primary Election ; 



43 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

SO what might occur thereat was of little consequence, as 
the " credentials " of " duly elected " delegates were already 
in possession of the leader, who, when the convention met, 
drew them from his pocket and, as there was no going be- 
hind the returns, his delegates took their seats. Of course 
the inspectors of the Primary attended at the time asd 
place designated, and the form of election was gone 
through with. If, at the Assembly District Convention^ 
there was any question raised as to the method of the elec, 
tion, or if there was what is known as " a contesting dele- 
gation," the matter was referred to a Committee on Cre- 
dentials, selected one from each Ward delegation, which 
committee reported according to the orders of the Boss-in- 
chief, or his deputy, the local leader. A contesting delega- 
tion, was, however, such a futile proceeding, that very few 
had the hardihood to try it. 

This modus ojMrandl of Primary elections for State pur- 
poses applied as well to the election of delegates to the 
various Conventions of the City for the nomination of all 
local officers. For instance, take a City, or as it was termed 
a County, Convention to nominate a Mayor and other muni- 
cipal officers and Judges. Primaries were called to elect 
delegates to a County Convention; by the same process 
that I have described above, the delegates were the selec- 
tion of the local leaders in the various Wards. Every local 
Boss controlled and owned the votes of his delegation 
and he in turn was controlled and owned by the Boss-in- 
Chief. The Boss-in-Chief therefore held that Convention 
in the palm of his hand. 

Can you now wonder how Boss Tweed owned not only 
the Mayor and other municipal officers, but even the Judges 
on the Bench ? 

But you may say, the calls for the Primaries were pub- 
lic, and could have been availed of by the citizens who 
were outside the influence of the " machine " ; and, that 



PRIMARY ELECTION FARCE. 43 

being so, why couldn't tliej have out-voted the ticket of the 
organization, and elected a ticket of their own, bj such a , 
large majority that there could have been no question about 
the result ? I answer, that numerous efforts had been made 
in this direction, but the persons who tried had always been 
circumvented by the " machine," even when the outsiders 
mustered four to one of the insiders, and it was done in this 
way : The inspectors of the Ward primaries were appointed 
by the General Committee of Tammany Hall, on the nomi- 
nation of the leaders of the Wards, as I have before ex- 
plained. The local Boss printed a list of delegates, to be 
" elected " at the primaries, which he called the " regular 
ticket." He had several hundred of these printed. He 
gave half a dozen of the printed tickets, or more if neces- 
sary, to each of his chosen followers, who were first at the 
place where the votes were received and deposited in a box, 
under the supervision and control of his inspectors, who 
readily permitted these early voters to stuff the box with 
any number of "regular tickets" they choose to put in 
them. Besides, if there were any real danger, the close fol- 
lowers, or as they were termed the "heelers," of the local 
leader, would keep possession of the main entrance to the 
place where the Primary was being held, on pretense of 
having not yet voted, and as there was generally only one 
hour for voting, those hostile to the organization were de- 
prived of any chance to cast their ballots. There was no 
use of attempting to force an entrance, as was sometimes 
done, because the police were under the control of the 
Tammany leaders and would permit no " disturbance " at 
the polls. 

But, you may argue, when the nominations are made in 
this arbitrary and dishonest manner, why should the people 
vote for the nominees ? Because, I answer. New York was 
then, as now, an overwhelmingly Democratic city. The 
Kepublican leaders made no effort to change it, regarding it 



I 



44 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

as a hopeless task. Instead, they made corrupt deals with 
Tweed and his associates, whereby they secured a certain 
portion of the patronage and plunder. This kept the Ee- 
publican leaders quiet, if not subservient, and whenever 
they made an apparent effort of opposition to Tweed's 
municipal ticket, it was merely a blind to deceive the | 
public. 

You may well wonder, after what I have stated, how such 
a power could have been broken ! It is true that many 
wise men in those days saw no hope for our redemption. 
There were a few sagacious, courageous and patriotic citi- 
zens, however, who had implicit faith in the majesty and 
potency of the ballot. These men, aided by the independ- 
ent journals, boldly called upon the people to assert their 
rights and protect their property ; and when at length they 
saw their real danger, they went to the polls, and in a few 
short hours struck a blow that hurled the marauders from 
power, and crushed to atoms the strong citadel which 
encircled Tweed and his accomplices. 



LETTER V. 

Building Up a Boss— The Time and "Sacrifices" Required 
— Tweed's Early Youth and Pig-Tail Experiences — 
The Stepping-Stone to His Twenty Years of Official 
Life— An Instance of His Kindness of Heart and 
Great Generosity — His Tact as a Politician — Shrewd- 
NESS Displayed by Him in Selecting and Placing His 
Lieutenants — Why He Desired to Secure Control 
of the Governorship — His Effort to Rout Albany 
Marauders — Ambitious Plans He Had Mapped Out. 

My dear Dean : 

It is an accepted saying that " poets are born, not made ". 
Whether this be true or not, I think it is an indisputable 
f;ict that Bosses are " made " ; and they have to go through 
a long and arduous process before the evolution produces a 
first-class specimen, such as graced or, rather, disgraced 
New York City during the time of which I am writing to 
you. 

The Boss to whom I refer certainly had to do much pre- 
liminary work, and make many " sacrifices in the interest 
of the public," ere he reached the zenith of his fame, as 
you will see by what follows. 

Comparatively little has been given to the world con- 
erning the boyhood of Tweed, who was the youngest and 
brightest son of Richard Tweed, a chairmaker doing busi- 
ness in New York City. William Marcy Tweed, his second 
son, was born at No. 1 Cherry street, April 3d, 1823. He 
was educated at a public school in Chrystie street, near 
Hester, and after being taught the three " R's " — " reading, 
'riting, 'rithmetic," the main requirements of a common 
school education in those days — learned his father's trade ; 
but he seems to have been taught how to make brushes as 
well as chairs, for he ran two stores in Pearl street, in 1851, 

45 



46 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

at which brushes were the specialty. Like all youth of the 
" male persuasion " during his boyhood, young Tweed was 
an ardent admirer of the dash and excitement of the Vol- 
unteer Fire Department. In whatever part of the City 
they resided, most school boys of that period became the 
champions of the engine, hose, or hook-and-ladder company 
located in their immediate vicinity, and as the nearest ap- 
paratus to young Tweed's domicile was that of "Black 
Joke" Engine Co. Ko. 33, located on Gouverneur street, 
near Henry, he displayed his fealty to that company by 
wearing on his suspenders, where they crossed his back, 
the figure " 33 " intaglioed on stitched leather — the custom 
at the time for men and boys interested in the Fire De- 
partment. When about fourteen years old, Tweed, who was 
large and strong for his age, became the leader of the boys 
who lived on Cherry street, between whom and the Henry 
" streeters ", (as the active youth on each street then styled 
themselves), there was a sort of entente cordiale because of 
the admiration of both for the same machine, ]^o. 33, and 
there were no " streeters " on the East side who could 
stand up against the combination ; nor would they — in the 
slang of those days — "take water" from any lads of their 
size and age anywhere in the City, who dared to say a word 
against their pet company. 

At the corner of Fourteenth street and Fourth avenue, 
there was then a plot of high ground, ten or twelve acres 
in area, which had been used as an orchard ; and this was 
the rendezvous or playground for East-side boys, especially 
on Saturday afternoons, and was the scene of many pitched 
battles between the rival "streeters". If at a fire or else- 
where there happened to be a collision between two fire 
companies, resulting in fisticuffs, the boy admirers of those 
companies would take up the fight and challenge the op- 
posing champions to meet them on Saturday at the place 
referred to, in order to " settle differences." ' ^ " 



« 



TWEED'S POLITICAL GROWTH. 47 

Young Tweed is said to have been quite a gladiator at 
this sort of thing. Another specialty, for which he and his 
vonng cronies became somewhat notorious, was the stealing, 
or " hooking", as they called it, of the tails of pigs, which 
they slyly cut off from the carcasses exposed at neighbor- 
ing provision stores. They would also "hook" Irish po- 
tatoes, and on Saturday afternoons hie to the stamping- 
ground to which I refer, and then, after roasting the re- 
sults of their foraging excursions, indulge in a picnic which 
they enjoyed with all the relish said to attend stolen sweets. 

At about the time Tweed reached his majority. Engine 
Company No. 33, to which he had been so much attached 
in his youth, and which, so to speak, he had grown up with, 
was disbanded — a process which was resorted to by the city 
authorities, in those days, when a company became too 
troublesome or permitted the rowdy element to bring it 
into disrepute. His attachment to the lire department 
service was such, however, that before his twenty-sixth 
year, or on January 1st, 1849, he was instrumental in or- 
ganizing Americus Engine Company, No. 6, and so popu- 
lar was he with his associates that, soon thereafter, he was 
put in command of the company as foreman, and became 
their " honored leader." 

I am reminded by an old volunteer fireman that while 
Tweed was foreman of " Big Six " (as the engine was then 
styled on account of its great capacity for work at fires) 
that company had many a lusty struggle with Engine Com- 
pany 8, and when a down-town alarm of fire was sounded, 
crowds would congregate in the vicinity of the junction of 
East Broadway and the Bowerj^, to watch the efforts of the 
two companies to " pass " each other. No. Eight lay in 
Ludlow Street, and came down Grand Street and through 
the Bowery. No. Six lay in Gouverneur Street, and came 
through East Broadway and thence into Chatham Square, 
and when the two companies met, the picturesque figure of 



48 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Tweed at the head of the well-manned rope of his apparatus, 
with his fire-trumpet high in the air, rallying his associates 
and urging them to do their best, the excitement was in- 
tense, the cheering of the bystanders furious, as was the 
enthusiasm of the rival companies when either gained in 
speed. 

His f oremanship of " Big Six " seems to have been the 
stepping-stone for Tweed's political career. His ambition 
made him Alderman of the Seventh Ward in 1852, which 
position, as the term was for two years, he also filled the 
ensuing year. The Board of Aldermen was also the Board 
of Supervisors then, and while it was said that there were 
some " lively times " for the Aldermen of that period, in 
the granting of street railway franchises, such was the 
character of the men who filled the offices of Mayor and 
Comptroller that no peculation of the public funds was 
suggested or tolerated. 

Having got a taste of public ofiice and become fascinated 
with it, Tweed now turned his eyes towards Washington, 
which in those days was the Mecca of all political aspirants, 
and before he had completed his first Aldermanic year was 
nominated and elected as a Representative in Congress in 
1852, and re-elected in 1854, serving two terms (four years). 
But it did not take very long for him to realize— and many 
would-be statesmen have had similar experience — that " an 
election to Congress was political death at home," for, 
unless one has especial fitness for Congressional position 
and great oratorical power, one soon becomes "unhonored 
and unsung" at Washington and, as the darkeys say, "no 
'count." So, in 1856, finding that the honors of Congress- 
man were, to him at least, like " Dead Sea fruit," Tweed 
began to prospect at home ; and as the only opening at the 
time was that of School Commissioner, he was "induced" 
to take even that unprofitable position, and held it during 
the years 1857 and 1858. Prior to this, he had entered 



i»OOH-BAH OF THE METROPOLIS. 49 

very vigorously into the Presidential campaign of 1856, 
when James Buchanan was elected over the dashing " Path- 
finder," John C. Fremont, who ran as first representative 
of the " Free Soil " or Republican party ; and on the occa- 
sion of Buchanan's inauguration as President, on March 4th 
of the following year, among the most picturesque of the 
clubs and associations which visited Washington, to par- 
ticipate in the usual ceremonial parade, was " Big Six " 
Engine Company from New York, with the commanding 
figure of ex-Congressman Tweed, in fireman's full rig, 
marching at the head of his companions who manned the 
i-ope — " the observed of all observers," and feeling himself 
every inch as important a man as " Jeems" Buchanan him- 
self. 

The make-up of the Board of Supervisors of the 
County of New York was changed in 1857, and, instead of 
the Alderoaen officiating as Supervisors, the new law pro- 
vided thatr the Board should be composed of twelve mem- 
bers to be elected on a general ticket — six only to be elected 
by the Democrats and six by the Republicans. In order to 
keep up this bi-partisan arrangement, it was further pro- 
vided that two members should retire every year, and two 
new members, one of each party, be elected in their stead. 
It so happened that it was Tweed's lot, he being one of 
the six Democrats elected in 1857, to remain during the 
whole five years contemplated by the law as a member of 
that Board of Supervisors. In 1863, the law being again 
altered to make the term of office of Supervisor six years, 
Tweed was re-elected, was president of the Board in 1863 
and 1864, served until the expiration of his term in 1868, 
and was then re-elected, serving as president of the Board 
in 1869, and remained as a member until July 1, 1870, when 
his term of office as Supervisor was cut short by a change 
made in the charter of 1870, which abolished the then ex- 
isting Board and returned to " first principles," making the 



So THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Board of Supervisors to consist of the Mayor, Recorder 
and Board of Aldermen. So it will be seen that for a 
period of thirteen years, from 185T to 1870, Tweed was a 
member of the Board of Supervisors, and during the most 
of that period he served on the more important committees, 
such as " Annual Taxes," " Taxation of Incorporations," 
" Court House," " Armories and Drill Rooms," all of which 
were regarded as what the members of the typographical 
fraternity would designate " fat takes." 

During this period of thirteen years (was the " thirteen " 
unlucky and prophetic of disaster ?) while Tweed was act- 
ing as Supervisor, he demonstrated that he did not wish to 
shirk any public duty required of him. Besides being 
Supervisor, he filled the office of Fire Commissioner during 
the years 1860 to 1864; and then, still further to show his 
willingness to " sacrifice " himself for the benefit of the 
public, in addition to the offices of Supervisor and Fire 
Commissioner, he took upon himself the oneroiis duties of 
Deputy Street Commissioner, under Commissioner Charles 
G. Cornell, during the years 1863 to 1865, whicli Depart- 
ment had at that time control over all improvements of 
streets as well as of the wharves and piers, but had nothing 
to do with street cleaning. 

In the Corporation Manual of 1866, Tweed is classified 
as " lawyer," Prior to this time his occupation doubtless 
might truly have been classed " politician," for he had long 
ceased to be a chairmaker. Be this as it may, having 
ceased to be Fire Commissioner, although he was still 
Supervisor, Tweed to keep himself '' busy " began to turn 
his eyes towards Albany, and in 1867 sought and secured 
the nomination for Senator; was elected; re-elected in 
1869, and again in 1871 ; and " thereby hangs a tale," of 
which I shall have more to say in subsequent letters. 

I have gone somewhat iuto detail regarding Tweed's 
early life and his political training, not only because of 



CSARACTERISTICS OF THE BOSS. 61 

their peculiar interest, but in order to emphasize the asser- 
tion made at the beginning of this letter, that Bosses 
differ from poets, in being " made." I shall not claim tliat 
Tweed's pig-tail performances in early youth indicated any 
evidence of the " statesmanship " of his after-life (for, when, 
in his days of trouble, he was enrolled as a convict at 
Blackwell's Island, he gave his occupation as '' statesman "). 
The pig-tail miscliievousness was a prank of early boyhood, 
"just for a lark," with no idea of dishonesty ; but it will be 
seen that from the year 1851, when he first became fore- 
man of an engine company, till 1871, when his political 
career came to an end, he was in a " continuous perform- 
ance " of official duties ; and the early seeds of Bossism 
which began to bud in his aim for the position of foreman 
of an engine company, blossomed and gained strength and 
glory in every political position he afterwards held, and 
culminated in his becoming a " real, bonafide, genuine 
original Boss " (with a big B) in January, 1868, when he 
first set his foot in Albany as Senator from the great City 
of New York, the acknowledged head and front of the 
Democratic organization of the metropolis, respected and 
honored (because feared) by all the leading lights of Demo- 
cracy (Tilden, Seymour, Churcli and others) in this State, 
and holding within his grasp all the power and ability, 
rightly directed, to have made himself a great man not 
only in New York but in the country at large. 

William M. Tweed was a man of rather commanding 
presence, standing fully five feet eleven inches in height, 
and weighing nearly if not quite three hundred pounds. 
His complexion was slightly florid, his features large, and 
there was always a merry twinkle in his eye when in the 
company of those he knew to be his friends ; a warmth in 
his greeting, and a heartiness in the grasp of his hand, 
which were reassuring to those properly introduced to him. 
He had a sympathetic heart, and those who knew him inti- 



ofj THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

mately knew that liis deeds of kindness and cliarity were 
almost numberless. He was a man, too, of generally correct 
habits. While of a social disposition, and fond of enter- 
taining his friends, he scarcely ever partook of more than a 
sip of wine when extending hospitalities, and never per- 
mitted strong drink to get the best of him ; neither did he 
have the tobacco habit. He was scrupulously careful con- 
cerning his attire, while never striving to make a show of 
dress. He was always suave and polite in manner, and while 
clinging to his friends with hooks of steel, was vigorous 
and most determined in his conflicts. There was nothing 
boastful or cowardly in his make-up, as was shown by 
the manner in which in 1871 he faced, single-handed, the 
fierce public denunciation of the Ring of which he was the 
actual head and front, although that position had always 
been conceded by Tweed himself to Peter B. Sweeny, who, 
while keeping as much as possible in the background, ac- 
quired the cognomen of " Peter Brains " Sweeny in recogni- 
tion of his admitted ability. 

As an instance of Tweed's kindly disposition and his 
generous private aid to the poor, his Christmas contribution 
of $50,000 for the relief of distress in the Seventh Ward, 
in 1870, deserves mention, not only for the magnitude of 
the gift, but for the manner in which it was bestowed. 
When the Committee in charge of the fund had received a 
considerable sum, including some subscriptions of $1,000, 
Judge Shandley called upon the Boss and asked him to 
attest concretely his sympathy for the good work in his 
native Ward. 

" Certainly," said Tweed ; " you can put me down for my 
share." 

" Put down the figures yourself, Mr. Tweed," replied the 
Judge. 

Seizing the pen, Tweed wrote his name on the subscrip- 
tion list, and opposite it he set the figures $5,000. 



INFLATED CONDITIONS OF THE TIMES. 53 

" Oh, Boss, put another nought to it," said Shandley, 
half in jest and lialf in earnest. 

" Well, well, here goes ! " said Tweed, in his quick way, 
, adding another nought to his gift, and handing the paper 
back to Shandlej. 

It is easy for any stern moralist to mutter " cheap liber- 
ality," and to hint that Tweed was making a shrewd invest- 
ment. I am no apologist for Tweed's wrongdoing; yet one 
can scarcely help regretting that some "■statesmen" who 
since his time, although in a different way, have fattened at 
the public crib, have sedulously avoided emulating the 
openhandedness of the original Boss. It may be imprudent 
nowadays for a Boss to call attention to great wealth sud- 
denly amassed in politics ; emphatically so, if one has had 
no other visible source of income ; for insolently inquisitive 
newspapers and busybodies are prone to cackle '' Where 
Did He Get It ? " 

But, aside from the personal surroundings of Tweed, to 
which I have referred, there were other conditions which, 
perhaps as much as his own ambition, contributed to the 
building up of that one-man power of which he was so 
typical an embodiment. The enormous expenditures and 
waste of the strife between the Northern and Southern 
States, known as " The Civil War," which existed for more 
than four years after its outbreak in 1861, and the vast 
issues of paper currency which it rendered necessary, 
stimulated every industrial pursuit in the country. New 
York City in a special manner felt the influence of the new 
order of things. Wages of every class of workers, whether 
with brains or hands, were suddenly and largely advanced. 
The prices of every product of the workshop were raised ; 
the plentifulness of money increased the number and ability 
of purchasers ; manufacturers enlarged their premises and 
plants ; new establishraentc sprung up in abundance to meet 
the increasing demand ; arts of every kind felt the influence 



54 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of "flusli times;" and in the midst of this. industrial mil- 
lenium the politicians of both parties joined in the general 
activity, and flourished " like green bay trees." 

In 1S66, the Republican party leaders, while busy at 
Washington in perfecting plans to secure control by " recon- 
struction '' of the Democratic Southern States, and rule them 
with carpet-baggers from the North, also endeavored, 
through legislation at Albany, to secure control of this 
Democratic stronghold, our Empire City ; and in order the 
better to accomplish this purpose, the plan was conceived 
of adding adjoining counties to New York County, calling 
the area "a Metropolitan District," and passing " recon- 
struction " laws known as the " Metropolitan District Police 
Act," the " Metropolitan Excise Law," and " Metropolitan 
Health Act " — the district to be governed by Commission- 
ers named in the acts or to be appointed by the Governor 
of the State, a Republican. The Democrats of New York 
strongly resented this interference with home rule, and, 
instead of Republicanizing New York City, this proceeding 
really augmented its Democratic majority, and arrayed 
against the Republican party almost unanimously the mem- 
bers of the extinguished Volunteer Fire Department 
(which was legislated out of existence in 1865), as well as 
the saloon keepers of the city, who had been harrassed 
by a puritanical enactment, for under the " Metropolitan 
Excise Law " was first introduced a system of espionage 
and a vexatious tyranny which exasperated to despera- 
tion thousands of orderly, well-behaved citizens and tax- 
payers who were victims of spies and subjected to persecu- 
tion. 

In all this Tweed saw his opportunity, and, as the head 
and front of the Democratic organization, took strong 
grounds against these ^'encroachments upon the liberties of 
the people." In the canvass for 1867, eveiy Democratic 
County and Judicial officer placed in nomination, as well as 



POLITICAL BARGAININGS AND 'DIVVIES." 55 

the four Senators and seventeen Assemblymen to which the 
city was then entitled, were elected by what was called 
"rousing majorities." That was the response of the met- 
ropolis to the Republican attempt to capture it. 

To further his ambitious plans, Tweed had succeeded, in 
1857, in placing on the Democratic County ticket his friends 
George G. Barnard, for Recorder, and Peter B. Sweeny 
for District Attorney, both of whom were elected ; and 
thus originated a political junta, which grew year by year 
in influence and power, and was the germ of a combina- 
tion that became almost invincible. 

At the expiration of Recorder Barnard's term, on Decem- 
ber 31, 1860, he was advanced by Tweed to the Supreme 
Court Bench, having been elected in I*^ovember of that 
year, which position he held for ten years, until removed 
by impeachment — of which and of its subject I shall have 
more to say in another letter ; for Judge Barnard figured 
very prominently in the public eye ; was, in fact, always a 
moving panorama of his time. I speak of him in this place 
only to show how shrewdly the developing Boss acted 
in locating his men on the political checker-board, so as to 
entrench himself and add to his power. 

During the second year of the Civil War, the Republicans, 
under the influence of the war feeling, had succeeded in 
electing their candidate for Mayor of this city, George 
Opdyke ; but at the end of his term, the Democrats regained 
possession of their stronghold, in securing C. Godfrey Gun- 
ther as Mayor, and Matthew T. Brennan as Comptroller. 
The City was at this time (1864) expending immense 
sums of money for volunteers, to fill its quota under the 
several calls of the President for additional troops, and the 
Board of Supervisors had the handling of these expendi- 
tures. Rumors were current of " divvies " being made, and 
of bargainings by Tweed with the Republicans in the Board 
of Supervisors. But he resented the charges, and claimed 



56 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

that liis friendly relations were simply tliose of policy — 
the making of the best terms possible with the Republican 
State leaders to protect Democratic interests in the met- 
ropolis. 

John T. Hoffman, a very popular member of the New 
York Bar, who filled the office of Recorder after Barnard's 
promotion, was then brought into the field by Tweed, who 
could not use Mr. Gunther (a somewhat " impracticable " 
and inharmonious chief magistrate, not of his political 
stripe), Hoffman was placed in nomination for Mayor in 
1865 and elected. 

Tweed now turned his eyes toward the State. The 
Republican Legislature had from time to time given the 
Democratic City government a great deal of trouble con- 
cerning the annual " Tax Levies " ; for at this time there 
was no Board of Estimate and Apportionment, which has 
now full control over all moneys needed for municipal pur- 
poses, but all authority to raise moneys for municipal ex- 
penses had then to be obtained at Albany. In these 
so-called '■'Tax Levies" were omnibused all appropriations 
for City expenditures, and as it was naturally conjectured 
by the lobby at Albany that in these annual bills there were 
always many " little jobs with meat in them," they found 
their passage through both branches of the Legislature and 
their approval by the Governor more or less difficult of at- 
tainment, according to circumstances. It was sometimes 
perplexing, even to the skilled mind of so experienced a 
manipulator as Tweed had now got to be, to "protect the 
interest of the people of his city against the marauders at 
Albany," as he used to express it. Now he determined, if 
possible, to spike the guns of the enemy by capturing the 
Governorship of the State. Mr. Hoffman had made a very 
Acceptable Mayor both to the people and to '• the powers 
that be," and Tweed decided to place him in the race for 
Governor iu the canvass of 1866. The ReDublicans, how- 



AMBITIOUS PROJECTS OF THE BOSS. 57 

ever, were too strongly fortified, and too liberally supplied 
with the sinews of war ; besides, residents of the interior of 
the State, who had been schooled during the war to believe 
all Democrats " copperheads," were not yet prepared to trust 
a representative of that party in the Gubernatorial chair ; 
so Mr. Hoffman failed of an election ; but his Mayoralty 
term did not expire till the end of another year. And here 
I may add, as one of the striking peculiarities of the 1866 
canvass in New York City, that Horace Greeley, the dis- 
tinguished editor of the Tribune, was a nominee for Kepre- 
sentetive in Congress, and was beaten ; while John Mor- 
rissey, an ex-prize lighter and a notorious gambler, then 
made his debut as an aspirant for public honors, and was 
chosen to fill a seat in Congress. 

Nothing daunted by this check in his advances toward 
the Republican stronghold— the capital of the State— which 
Tweed realized in the defeat of his candidate for Governor 
in 1 866, he determined in 1867 to secure the Comptrollership 
of the City for Richard B. Connolly (formerly County Clerk), 
and to make a bold attack upon the Legislature itself. 
Accordingly, in that year he sought and obtained a nomina- 
tion for Senator, and (as already stated) was of course 
elected, together with four more Democratic Senators from 
the City, whom he believed he could " handle," and when 
thus entrenched with power, he felt it would be easy for 
him, as the acknowledged Boss, to manipulate matters so 
as to secure the election of his favorite candidate for Gov- 
ernor at the next ensuing Gubernatorial election in I8680 In 
this he was successful. And the further programme as 
mapped out in the mind of this American Macchiavelli, the 
now ahnost absolute political dictator of the Empire State, 
had it not been " nipped in the bud " by the Eing disinte- 
gration of 1871, (of which r shall have something of especial 
interest to say in subsequent letters) was that John T. Hoff- 
man, then Governor, should become President in 1872 ; 



58 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

that A. Oakey Hall, then Mayor, should become Governor ; 
that Tweed himself should fill the position of United States 
Senator at the first vacancy ; that Connolly should man the 
New York fort in the office of the Comptroller (because 
there " was money in it," which he liked ;) while Peter B. 
Sweeney, who had no taste for public office, was to remain 
" the power behind the throne." 

Such were the forecastings whispered at Albany on the 
eve of the adjournment of the Legislature, in the Spring of 
1871, and every Democratic member of the Senate (seven- 
teen of the thirty-two members were Democrats) was per- 
sonally urged to use his best endeavors to return to the 
Legislature to be elected that Fall, so as to help prepara- 
tions for the ensuing Presidential campaign. But, as Burns 
says : 

" The best laid schemes of mice and men 
Gang aft agley." 

Ere six months had- passed, Tweed and his confreres, so 
potential at the period referred to, were routed, dethroned, 
destroyed ; and by reason of the wide influence of the ex- 
posed rascalities of Democratic office holders, the Demo- 
cratic vote not only in this City, but in this State, was 
thoroughly demoralized, and in the Legislature that was 
elected in 1871 instead of there being seventeen Democratic 
Senators, there were only seven ! 

But, had not this upheaval taken place, had Tweed's am- 
bitious purposes been carried out as foreshadowed, and had 
Connolly taken a notion to "swap " the position of Comp- 
troller of the City of New York for that of Secretary of 
the Treasury under President Hoffman, the Astors, the 
Yanderbilts, the Goulds and the Kockfellers would no 
doubt have been very " small potato " millionaires com- 
pared with the great and glorious " Slippery Dick." 




(Kedrawn from Harper's Weekly. By permission. ) 

A. Oakey Hall. 



I 



LETTER Vi. 

Extending New York Tactics to the Suburbs— How GrREEit 
Met Greek at Highbridgeville— Proposed Attempt of 
Ruffians to raid a Primary Meeting Checked by a 
Loaded Cannon— Colonel Mooney's Victory and How 
He Became Master of the Situation— A Square Deal 
THAT Was Not Intended— How the Colonel Beat the 
" Machine '' at Its Own Game. 

My dear Dean : 

The " methods " of Kew York City politics and poli- 
ticians, which are such a marvel to foreigners, such a mys- 
tery to people generally who have never assisted therein, 
and which I endeavored to explain in a preceding letter, 
can perhaps be best understood by the introduction of a few 
instances, of actual occurrence, to furnish practical illustra- 
tion of some of the incidentals of *' machine " work. 

When the inventor of a new device in mechanism desires 
to show the merits of his invention, he always aims to make 
the test of its efficiency under the most favorable conditions, 
and to this end he selects as the field for the experiment 
some place where his apparatus may appear to best advan- 
tage by contrast with old contrivances. In like manner, I 
propose to take you over virgin soil, where the methods of 
the Tammany machine were unknown, and where np to the 
period of which I am about to write, old-time, simple 
political methods prevailed in party management, which 
were ruthlessly brushed aside by the advent of new tactics. 

The people of the upper Wards of this metropolis knew 
little of the inside of JSTew York City politics until the 
arrival of Colonel James J. Mooney in their midst in 1867. 
Prior to that time the Old Town of Morrisania, now the 
Twenty-third Ward, although it had grown out of its swad- 

59 



60 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

dling clothes and had taken on garments somewhat resem- 
bling those of tlie metropolis (being under the government 
of a Board of Trustees, the members of which were in- 
vested with all the powers and authority of a Board of 
Aldermen), were still distinctively " country " in all the 
methods pertaining to elections, and such a thing as a row, 
or a " double shuffle," at primary or caucus had never been 
known. In the adjoining town of West Farms (now the 
Twenty-fourth Ward) which at the time referred to had 
made no advances city-ward, the usages forming the inci- 
dentals of elections in all other parts of the State still pre- 
vailed. In obedience to the call of the State Committee for 
a State Convention, the officers of the last Assembly Dis- 
trict Convention would issue a call for an Assembly District 
Convention, and in response thereto the officers of the town 
caucus of the preceding year would advertise a call for a 
town caucus to select as many delegates as the town was 
entitled to, to represent the locality in said Assembly Dis- 
trict Convention ; which authority (to insure regularity) 
was always given to the officers of a preceding town caucus, 
as also to those of an Assembly District Convention, a 
County Convention, a Congressional, a Senatorial, or a 
Judiciary Convention. 

The rural way of choosing inspectors of elections was ,to 
elect them annually at the same time that town officers 
were elected, in the month of March, when each of the 
parties (Democratic and Kepublican) voted for two in- 
spectors, and whichever of the inspectors named on the 
minority ticket received the larger number of votes was, by 
law, appointed the third inspector, charged with the duty 
of counting the ballots at the next ensuing general election 
in November. 

This system, you will see, conferred ample power upon 
the people to choose those entrusted with the charge of 
countina: the ballots: there was no "cut and dried" busi- 



TAMMANY TACTICS ABOVE THE HARLEM. 61 

ness there. But in Morrisania, then half-city and half- 
country, as the town was divided into Wards so that each 
section might he represented in the Board of Trustees, a 
separate election was held in the month of June for the 
choice of these officers ; and the inspectors of election for 
each Ward, as well as the places for holding the election, 
were according to law to be selected by the Board of 
Trustees, and by courtesy the authority for making this 
choice was conferred upon the individual Trustee from 
each of the Wards. 

Colonel Mooney was born and brought up on the North 
Kiver side of the city, and claimed to be a direct descendant 
of William Mooney, who (as told in a preceding letter) or- 
ganized the Tammany Society in 1T89. Like almost every- 
body who had figured in city politics in those days, the 
Colonel had been a " fire laddie " and a somewhat lively 
boy, but he had profited by his experience and developed 
into a self-made man, of strong character, whom everybody 
liked, and who prided himself on meriting the confidence 
he inspired. 

When the Civil War broke out, Colonel Mooney was 
among the first to declare himself in favor of upholding 
the Union, organized a company, and was commissioned as 
captain in the "Tammany Regiment" which, under the 
Colonelcy of William D. Kennedy, marched to the front and 
took part in the campaign of Virginia. During the service 
Colonel Kennedy died, and, when the war was over. Colonel 
Mooney rode home in command of a veteran regiment, he 
having reached that rank through promotion for bravery 
and good conduct. 

A year or two after the close of the war, the Colonel 
opened a hotel near Highbridgeville, in the suburban town 
of Morrisania, and ere long, from old associations in the 
rc.etropoli8, he drifted into politics, making his entree as 
aspirant for the office of member of the Board of Trustees 



62 THIRXr YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

(or Alderman) from liis Ward, then a sparsely inhabitated 
district. To this position he was elected. The term of 
service was only for one year, and when he made it known 
that he would be a candidate for re-election, a rival sprang 
up in the person of one William Florence, also a well- 
known hotel-keeper ; and their professional as well as politi- 
cal rivalry led to the introduction of certain JN'ew York 
political methods in that previously quiet and demure 
locality. 

A Ward nominating Convention was called, through the 
instrumentality of the Colonel, to meet at his own hotel. 
To this move Florence took exception, as giving the Colonel 
an unfair advantage, and he made up his mind to counter- 
act it by strategy and force. So he very quietly (as he 
thought) hired a gang of some seventy-five men, including 
his own employees, who were to assemble near his hostelry 
at about the time stated in the call for the assembling of 
the Convention, march in a body to the meeting place in 
Mooney's hotel, take possession of the room, refuse ad- 
mission to Mooney's friends, and then and there nominate 
Florence instead of Mooney. But the plan was divulged 
and got to the alert ear of Colonel Mooney, who determined 
to " block the game." In front of the Colonel's hotel was 
a high flag-staff, and at the base of the staff was a cannon of 
considerable size — a relic of the war — which the Colonel's 
regiment had captured in one of its battles. During the 
day set for the Convention, the Colonel heavily charged 
this gun with powder, filled it almost to the muzzle with 
broken bottles, flints, scrap-iron, and kindred missiles, and 
then located the cannon so as to command the only open 
highway by which his opponent's gang must come in their 
march to his hotel. Having thus fortified himself, the 
Colonel, at about 7 o'clock in the evening, sent a trusty 
messenger to his opponent, to state that the plans for 
attacking the Colonel's premises and seizing the Conven- 



Logic of a loaded CANNoisf. 63 

tion were fully known ; that the Colonel had made prepara- 
tions to defend the citizens of his district " in the free 
exercise of their right to choose a nominee "; that, if 
Florence persisted in carrying out his scheme to besiege 
the Colonel's hotel with a gang of hired ruffians, the Colo- 
nel would shoot them down like dogs; that his artillery 
was loaded and prepared for the emergency, and that, due 
notice having been given, upon Florence would devolve 
responsibility for the proposed outrage and the resultant 
carnage. 

Florence despatched scouts to see what Colonel Mooney's 
messenger really meant. Upon their return and report, 
Florence, concluding that discretion was the better part of 
valor, sent orders to his reserved forces that their services 
would not then be needed. The result was a notably 
peaceable and welhconducted Convention, and the unani- 
mous nomination of Colonel Mooney. 

This coxi]) cfetat on the part of the Colonel made him 
undisputed Boss of the election district in which he lived, 
and no further attempt at rebellion was evidenced, more 
particularly as the Colonel thereafter permanently estab- 
lished " the New York system " in his district. Whenever 
it was necessary to select delegates to a Convention, after 
he, as the representative from his Ward, had appointed his 
inspectors, he simply wrote out a list of delegates, sent for 
the inspectors, treated them in royal fashion at his hotel, 
made out then and there a " certiticate " — in New Tork 
style —that the persons named on his list were the duly 
elected delegates, put the whole machinery, so to speak, in 
his inside pocket, never troubled his neighbors to attend 
any primary at all, but instructed the " delegates " he had 
chosen to attend the Convention as called, and to cast a 
unanimous vote for such candidate or candidates as he 
might favor. It is obvious that this procedm-e made the 
Colonel master of the situation. Such methods, universal 



64 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

at Primary Elections in this city, were not only novel to tlie 
simple people of the Highbridgeville district, but they had 
the charm of success about them. Believing in his invinci- 
bility in politics, a large number followed the Colonel's 
fortunes, and he, almost iat a spring, became the unques- 
tioned leader, and was termed, as a compliment to his dash 
and recklessness, "the Ollagawalla Chief" — which name 
followed him until the day of his death, a little more than 
a year ago. 

Another characteristic primary in which Colonel Mooney 
figured and which, although not so intended, resulted in a 
" fair and square '' election, is worthy of passing mention. 
The first election for Alderman from the Twenty-third and 
Twenty-lourth Wards, under the Act of Annexation of the 
towns of Morrisania, West Farms, and Kingsbridge to 
the City of New York, occurred in the fall of 1874. 
Colonel Mooney was the unanimous choice of the Democ- 
racy of the Twenty-third Ward for the nomination, 
but, as at that time the Aldermen were elected from dis- 
tricts corresponding with the Senatorial districts, which 
comprised five or six Assembly Districts or Wards, the 
preference of a single Ward did not count against the edict 
of Tammany's Boss, who, it was understood, had decided 
that a personal favorite should be nominated for that position. 
Yet, fearful that the Colonel might, because of his personal 
popularity, " get away " with the nomination in spite of 
orders to the contrary, it was determined to head him off in 
his own Ward. Being then a part and parcel of the City 
of New York, old town methods were of course obsolete, 
and, instead of Primaries in every election district, a single 
Primary was held in the Ward, as in all the Assembly dis- 
tricts of the City. This being the first Primary held since 
annexation, the machinery was to be worked from the head- 
quarters of Tammany Hall in Fourteenth street. To make 
everything " look square," however, each of the aspirants 



BEATING THE MACHINE AT ITS OWN GAME. 65 

for the Aldermanic nomination was accorded a representa- 
tive in the trio of inspectors selected, and assurances were 
given out tliat there was going to be "a square deal." 
But "under the rose," something entirely different was 
mapped out. 

Colonel Mooney was so popular that he had friends 
all over the City ; and one of a gang of roughs, numbering 
about one hundred, who had been engaged " for that night 
only," as soon as he ascertained that he was to work against 
the Colonel, to whom he was devoted, straightway informed 
that gentleman. 

" All right ! '' said the Colonel ; " Til show 'em that two 
can play at that game." 

He went to work at once. He could not call into play a 
cannon, as he had done on a previous occasion when con- 
ditions looked desperate ; but he got together what an- 
swered his purpose equally well. Ex-District Judge Gus 
Hebermann had become a resident of the Twenty-third 
Ward, and to him was entrusted the job of " doing up " the 
Colonel. The polls were to be opened at 8 o'clock in a place 
then known as Morrisania Hall, on Kailroad avenue near One 
Hundred and Sixty-seventh street. Shortly after 7 o'clock 
Gus Hebermann sauntered along Third avenue to one of the 
large brewery establishments located near One Hundred and 
Sixty- sixth street. This was the place of rendezvous he had 
appointed. The men put under his command by the 
Colonel's rival were on hand. Hebermann, who was a 
pompous character, with a deep, growling voice, entered 
the brewery with a swagger, and in the presence of his 
henchmen took from his pockets a package of money, his 
massive watch and chain and other articles of value, and 
with a frowning and determined countenance, ostentatiously 
placed them in charge of the proprietor for safe-keeping. 
This was intended to show that he was making suitable 
preparations for a terrible encounter with " Ollagawalla " 



66 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Mooney. He then, witli a stern face, invited tlie gang that 
he was to lead in battle to " take something," during which 
performance he, with the air of a commander-in-chief, 
gave instructions, the most important being that every one 
of his men must vote at least five times, hailing from the 
several breweries of the town, of which there were a dozen, 
and giving different names if required when voting. To 
inspirit them, he added that he was going to give the 
Colonel " an elegant surprise party." 

Like the cautious general that he was, Hebermann an- 
nounced that he would go and reconnoitre, leaving his men 
behind. When he reached Morrisania Hall, he was amazed 
to find its doors surrounded by a gang of the most notorious 
cut-throats and ruffians that could be raked and scraped to- 
gether from the North Kiver side of the city, while 
Colonel Mooney was seated on the railing of the piazza, 
coolly smoking a cigar. Observing Hebermann approach- 
ing, the Colonel saluted him with : " How are you, Gus ? 
Well fixed for to-night— eh ? " 

" What do you mean ? " asked Hebermann, while a couple 
of the Colonel's most ferocious-looking hirelings walked 
towards Gus, waiting for a signal to begin operations. 

" Well," replied the Colonel, " I understand all about 
your game ; I am prepared for you— see ? If you bring 
your gang of repeaters to interfere with a fair election at 
this poll, you can bet dollars to doughnuts there Avill be 
work for the Coroner over more than a dozen of them." 

" That's so," exclaimed the leader of the gang hired by 

the Colonel, " and for two pins I'd make d d short work 

of you — d'ye hear that ? " 

At a look and a shake of the head from the Colonel, the 

gladiator desisted. Hebermann, who had been quite a 

, " rounder " himself, could see, from his knowledge of the 

men Mooney had got together, that the Colonel " meant 

business," ^nd, putting on an air of careless innocence, as- 



DOING UP A GANG OF REPEATERS. 67 

sured him that he was entirely mistaken and that the story 
told him was false, and so forth ; but at the first oppor- 
tunity he sent word by one of his accompanying scouts that 
none of his men should leave the brewery until he re- 
turned ; then waited around the poll till he had deposited 
his ballot, and retired from the scene of action, subdued and 
crestfallen. The repeaters did not, of course, make their 
appearance at the Primary, but they got their fill of beer, 
and next morning more than a dozen of them found them- 
selves at the police station, not a few of them with black- 
ened eyes and bloody heads, for, there being no work at the 
Primary for the Colonel's men to do, they straggled around 
town, and wherever they came across a chap they knew to 
have been hired for the opposition, they had "some fun" 
with him. 



LETTEE YII. 

The Old Volunteer Fire Department and Its Fascination — 
How IT Differed from the Present Fire System — Good 
Conduct of the " Old Boys " when Disbanded — How 
They used to "Amuse" Themselves After a Fire — A 
Mel^e in Which Senator "Dave" Broderick Lost His 
Fire Cap — Harry Howard's Love Romance, and How 
He Made Mayor Fernando Wood Act "Square" For 
Once — The Relic of the Volunteer Department in 
Mount Morris Park, 

My dear Dean : 

To one who takes an interest in the study of character, 
and desires to extend his knowledge of men and things, 1 
know of no position more advantageous than that of a 
member of the Legislature of the State of New York, and 
especially that of a member of the popular branch of that 
body. The term of office of a member of the Assembly is 
only one year, and, consequently, while there are instances 
of members being returned two, three, or more years in 
succession, one may safely calculate to meet at least seventy 
or eighty new faces every year upon the assembling of the 
members of Assembly "on the first Tuesday after the first 
Monday in January." Coming from all parts of the State, 
representing almost every avocation, and almost every 
condition of men, the tout ensemhle affords, as I have 
stated, a very interesting group for the student of human 
nature. 

One of the most interesting members who answered to 
the roll-call of the Assembly clerk in 1868 was John 
Decker, of Kichmond County, " the Chief " as he was des- 
ignated, because he was the last acting Chief Engineer of 
the Yolunteer Fire Department of the City of New York, 

. 68 



VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT AND ITS CHIEFS. 69 

an institution to which I have had occasion to refer in pre- 
vious letters, and around which cluster memories of espe- 
cial interest to New Yorkers of fifty years of age and ovef, 
and a brief reference to which, I cannot help thinking, will 
be entertaining to you. 

John Decker, at the time I first knew him, was about 
fort}' years of age, of fine physique, good moral character, 
and strong common sense. He had won no diploma from 
university or college. He had an honest-looking face, 
impressive features, and the sole peculiarity about him was 
a wedge-shaped goatee, which, starting about an inch in 
width from his lower lip, widened like a fan until it almost 
concealed his necktie as it rested on his shirt-bosom about 
four inches from its starting point. No matter what subject 
Decker might start to converse upon, he always wound up 
with some reference to the Yolunteer (or " Wolunteer " as 
he insisted upon pronouncing it) Fire Department. He 
had had thirty years' experience, man and boy, in that 
branch of the public service, including seven years as an 
Assistant Engineer and five years as Chief Engineer; and 
while never boastful of his exploits, his eyes always 
sparkled with pleasure and satisfaction if you should utter 
a word of praise while looking at a gold medal he always 
carried with him, which had been given him by the Com- 
m.on Council of the City for saving the lives of two children 
from a blazing factory in December, 1863. In commemo- 
ration of this deed he afterwards also received a silver 
trumpet from Engine Company No. 14, of which he was 
an ex-member ; and the presentation address at the Chief's 
house was delivered by Rev. Dr. Burchard, the same 
reverend gentleman, I believe, whose remarkable speech, 
denouncing the Democracy as "the party of Rum, 
Romanism and Rebellion," no doubt lost the Presidency 
to James G. Blaine, when running for that office in 1884:, 
against Grover Cleveland. 



"^O 'THlRTy YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITIC^?. 

Mr. Decker's immediate predecessor, as Chief of thd 
Volunteer Fire Department, was Harry Howard, who had 
iflled that position from 1857 to 1860. He, too, had served 
seven years as Assistant Engineer before promotion, and 
gave, altogether, twenty-five years of his life to his idolized 
institution. When about forty-five years old he had to 
retire from active service because of an attack of paralysis, 
which occurred on his way to a fire and which left him 
permanently crippled. He was one of the best-known men 
in New York, and the last public parade in which he took 
part was that of the Columbus Anniversary in 1892, when, 
a division having been set apart for them, the old fire-fight- 
ing veterans of the metropolis, headed by the yet stalwart 
form of Harry Howard, limping along over the five-mile 
route of the procession, elicited a five-mile roar of cheering 
from the populace, who still revered the memory of the 
Yolunteer organization and honored its old Chief. 

"What, you may ask, was the attraction in the old Volun- 
teer Fire Department, which could induce Decker and 
Howard and thousands of other well-known citizens to give 
up so many years of service to it, and without compensation 
in any position except that of Chief Engineer? From 
time immemorial the Fire Department of this city has been 
invested with a fascination irresistible alike to old and 
young. In the archives of the city is a memorial, dated 
January 11, 1753, referring to the New York firemen, 
which may answer your query regarding the Volunteer Fire 
Department of more modern times. Here is what the 
memorial says : 

" It is a common observation that the firemen of this city are remark- 
able for their agility in extinguishing fires. And since so judicious a 
poet as Virgil hath compared the industry of the Tyrians to the labors 
of the bee, I think the amazing celerity -with which the firemen cluster 
together at tlie ringing of the fire bells may be fitly resembled to the 
Bwarming of those curious insects at the sound of the instrument used 
for that purpose. To pursue the simile, there is not a drone among 



ATTRACTIONS OF TII^ OLD FIRE SYSTEM. Tl 

tbem, but rich and poor are alike indefatigable in preserving lluir 
neighbors' property from the devouring flames. It is an universal 
hurry and incessant activity; nay, they have often exposed themselves 
to the peril of their lives and performed feats almost surpassing com- 
prehension and belief. They toil with unwearying diligence, and seem 
insensible of the danger which threatens them. In a word, they stand 
up in the midst of flames as unconcerned Salamanders, mocking at fear, 
and striving to outvie each other in suppressing the general calamity— 
a noble emulation and worthy of the highest eulogium." 

All classes and conditions were represented in the ranks of 
the Volunteer Firemen. The mechanic and the son of the 
wealthy merchant were indistinguishable under the volun- 
teer's heavy lire-cap, and endeavored to surpass each other 
in labors and daring. College graduates, lawyers and 
bankers drew the silver-mounted carriage of their favorite 
hose company to the scene of peril, and butchers and 
brokers, blacksmiths and dry-goods men did brave work 
amid the flames, in obedience to the orders of the chief in 
command. A fireman had to keep himself prepared at all 
hours, day and night, to respond to an alarm of fire (which 
was heralded by alarm bells stationed in different parts of 
the city as well as on the City Hall), and had to run to the 
engine-house, or after the engine if it had left for the fire. 
A fireman would sleep with his bedroom window partly 
open, with his fire clothes at his bedside, and with his ear 
trained to hear the first stroke of the alarm bell ; would 
arise in great haste and rush, only half-dressed, to the street, 
with his coat on his arm, and finish dressing while he sped 
to the engine house. And, remember, that all this service 
was voluntary, the satisfaction of duty well-performed being 
its only reward, apart from the incidental excitement and 
the pride every man felt in his favorite apparatus — which 
seemed to be " all the world" to many of them. And then 
the firemen's parades. " How attractive they were ! " 
writes an enthusiastic admirer of the old Volunteer Depart- 
ment : " What a magnificent polish the engines took ; how 
lavishly they were garlanded with flowers ; and how joyful 



t3 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

were the long lines of red-sliirted fire laddies who manned 
the ropes, and were the cynosure of the admiring eyes of 
all feminine Gotham, The men who carried the trumpets 
were the conquering heroes of the day and the envy of 
every boyish beholder." 

It seemed a pity that an institution so popular as was the 
Volunteer Fire Department, should have been superseded. 
But, with the rapid growth of the city, and its gigantic 
strides in population, the duties of the firemen became 
more and more exacting, and besides, in later years, the 
department in certain sections of the city had drawn around 
it a rough set of " runners " and rowdies, who were 
gradually bringing the time-honored institution into disre- 
pute. And so a bill establishing a Paid Fire Department 
in the City of New York was passed by the Legislature on 
the 30th of March, 1865. It was predicted by the oppo- 
nents of the measure that the whole Fire Department, 
about four thousand strong, would resist the enactment, or 
in a body resign, throw up their apparatus, and make possi- 
ble a calamitous destruction of property should a fire ensue. 
But, so far from acting in any unruly manner, the members 
one and all exhibited the best spirit, and submitted cheer- 
fully to the changed conditions. 

One peculiarity of the Act creating the Metropolitan 
Fire Department was that it prescribed the style of uniform 
to be worn by the ofiicers and men. The uniform of the 
Chief Engineer, it was 'then provided, ''shall be a red 
flannel shirt, made double-breasted with rolling collar, dark 
blue pilot cloth coat, in length to reach to and not below 
the knees, with pantaloons of the same material, with fire 
cap, of the New York cone style, with gilt front and a 
device of a steam fire engine, with the word ' Chief ' in 
the arch above, and the initials of the wearer under, the 
device and lettering to be in black." Officers and members 
of companies were to be dressed in the same style, except 



INTRODUCTION OF THE PAID DEPARTMENT. 73 

that they had to wear black (instead of white) leather fire 
caps, with the letters " M. F. D." in the arch of the front. 
This curiously worded Act further provided that " racing 
to lires " was prohibited; and " if the apparatus of several 
companies proceed on the same street to or from a fire, 
they shall do so in single file." 

Of course, there was no incentive to "racing" in the 
paid Fire Department, for horses took the place of men, 
and there has never been a race since the new Department 
was organized. But while the existing organization lacks 
the incentive and license which made the Yoluuteer Fire 
Department so fascinating to its members, there is no dis- 
pute that it possesses incomparably greater efiiciency than 
the old system ; and New York can to-day, with justice, 
boast of an organization unequalled in the world for ability, 
activity, intelligence and cool courage. But the paid fire- 
men have few such hardships to contend with as the volun- 
teer firemen had. They sleep at the engine house, ready 
for an alarm of fire by the telegraph in the house. They 
slide down a brass rod to the engine floor, get on the engine 
or tender, and, witb well-trained horses, are soon at the fire ; 
and, after attaching hose to the hydrant, they have steam 
to do all the work of throwing water on the fire to ex- 
tinguish it. The men go home with the engine, as they 
came, and find a pleasant place to rest. It was not so with 
^he Volunteer firemen, as I have shown. 

On the night of October 13, 1860, a few years before its 
disbandment, the Volunteer Fire Department of this city 
gave a grand torchlight parade in honor of the Prince of 
Wales, when nearly five thousand uniformed firemen, 
with their profusely decorated and illuminated machines, 
marched past the Fifth Avenue Hotel, from nine o'clock 
until eleven, and were reviewed from the balcony of that 
establishment by the eldest son of Queen Victoria. Almost 
every man held a torch iri his haiid, hundreds of rockets 



74 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

were constantly flashing in tlie sky, and as the companies 
advanced in procession before the Prince, the air was rent 
with cheers to which his Royal Highness responded by 
gracefully touching his hat. 

But I want to portray something of the exciting interest 
which so attached the " old boys " to their favorite com- 
panies ; and perhaps I cannot better do so than by relating 
an incident, showing the intense earnestness to which the 
competition between rival companies gave rise, although I 
cannot hope to do this with the Homeric simplicity and art 
displayed by the old ex-Chief, Assemblyman Decker, when 
he narrated the facts to me. 

For a long period a "grudge" existed between Engine 
companies N^o. 34 and No. 27. The famous David C. (or 
"Dave") Broderick, afterwards United States Senator from 
California, was foreman of No. 34. On the side of No. 27 
as foreman was John R. Mount, afterwards Police Captain, 
with Ely Hazelton, assistant foreman. Before attaining the 
position of foreman, Mount had figured in various "epi- 
sodes " in the annals of the Department ; while Hazelton, 
always "full of the devil," (as Decker emphatically ex- 
pressed it), and priding himself on his muscle, contrived 
to have some kind of a tussle with No. 34's men whenever, 
during Mount's absence, he was in command of the com- 
pany. The rival companies were located not many blocks 
apart, and, whenever possible, they would " race " each 
other to a fire. After the fire was out and the companies 
homeward bound, if they happened to reach the same street 
at the same time, (and when Hazleton was in command they 
somehow invariably did so), the "runners" or outside 
attaches of each machine would manage to collide. Alter- 
cations were thus of frequent occurrence, and the scene of 
contest was generally in the vicinity of Duane and Chatham 
streets, which locality was kept in a state of commotion 
whenever there was an alarm of fire in that district. Thq 



RIVALRIES OF THE FIRE FIGHTERS. 75 

two companies were pretty equally matched, and when they 
did liave a " controversy," it was hard to tell which got the 
better of the argument. 

One Sunday, No. 34, having made due preparations, 
caught No. 27 somewhat short-handed, " went for " her like 
an avalanche, and not only '"washed" but "licked" her. 
In elucidation of these expressions, so pat with the ex-Chief, 
but which needed some translation for me, I may say that, 
before the introduction of steam fire apparatus, the old hand- 
power engines, in order to utilize the street hydrants, some 
distance apart, had to form lines; one apparatus, taking 
water from a hydrant, would supply through several lengths 
of hose another apparatus, and so on till the scene of con- 
flagration was reached, the last apparatus through its hose 
and pipe doing the best execution possible on the fire ; the 
men on the brakes of the several engines working at the rate 
of about one hundred and sixty strokes a minute, each 
man working only half a minute, and then retiring ex- 
hausted, while another jumped in and took his place, at the 
risk of having his fingers cut off or his head broken by the 
descending brakes. Whenever one engine pumped water 
into another faster than the receiving engine could get rid 
of it, the water would of course overflow her box, and she 
got " washed " ; and then there was a " Hurrah, boys ! " 
time very humiliating to the "washed" company. On the 
occasion spoken of. No. 34 had not only succeeded, as I 
have stated, in "washing" No. 27, but (in Decker's ex- 
pressive phrase) had "licked" her, meaning that on her 
way home the runners of the triumphant engine had so 
flouted and irritated the humiliated company that a row 
ensued, and the adherents of No. 27 had got soundly 
thrashed, in the bargain ! 

About three weeks after this " licking," No. 27's fellows 
(who had meanwhile been preparing for an " emergency ") 
met No. 34's boys at a fire in what was then Van Renwyck 



76 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

street So well had Hazleton drilled his men to conceal 
their hostile intention from 34's company, that the latter 
felt, up to the very moment when the "charge of the light 
brigade " was made on them in Hudson street, that there 
would be no " fuss " that day ; that No. 27's boys had got 
enough at the last encounter to satisfy them ; and, secure 
in such confidence, " Dave " Broderick, foreman of No. 34, 
was walking along a little distance in the rear of his engine, 
on its return home, when, suddenly, someone from behind 
knocked his firecap from off his head. Turning quickly, he 
saw a big, strapping fellow, with the figures "27" on his 
shirt front, who, as Broderick made an effort to secure his 
cap, jumped upon and threw him to the ground, and then, 
with a wild war-whoop of victory, picked up his fire-cap 
and ran off with it as a trophy. 

What his enemy's scalp was to an Indian, the fire-cap of 
an opponent was to a fireman fighter ; it was a trophy of 
his foe's defeat, a badge of his own glory. As Broderick's 
assailant, on the run, held the captured fire-cap aloft and 
gave a yell of triumph, as if this were a preconcerted signal, 
No. 27's " fellows " rushed the fight all along the line, and 
the " engagement was general." Broderick never felt so 
badly in his life. He had been taken completely by sur- 
prise — by a " fire in the rear," as it were ; and as he gazed 
upon the lively melee ahead of him, he felt like Sheridan, 
in Buchanan Read's poem, " miles away." Bareheaded as 
he was, he threw himself, trumpet in hand, into the midst 
of the fray, hoping to transform threatened defeat into vic- 
tory ; but he did not ; he could not. No. 27's leader had 
laid his plans too well ; Ely Hazleton was " too many " for 
him. After about half an hour of terrific fighting, resulting 
in broken bones, broken heads, and one fatal injury, No. 34'8 
fellows were bodily driven from the scene of conflict, 
leaving their apparatus behind them. It was a Wa,terloQ 
defeat. No. 27 had ha4 its revenge. 



Harry iioward's love rOxMance. I'r 

Next day there was a grand jubilee at the headquarters 
of Engine No. 27, in Desbrosses street; while, with fife 
and drum to lead the way, Ely Ilazleton and " Dave " 
Broderick's assailant, arm in arm, bearing aloft on the top 
of a pole " Dave " Broderick's fire-cap, piloted the fighting 
element of No. 27 in a parade around the vicinity of the 
house of their favorite engine, and past the engine house 
of No. 34, as if inviting somebody or anybody to " tread on 
the tails of their coats." For a climax they fastened the 
pole, (surmounted by their trophy of victory), on the top of 
their engine house, with three cheers and a tiger that swelled 
the hearts and heads of the members of Engine Co. 27, as 
they gazed upon the fire-cap of the discomfited " Dave." 
Never again was there any serious trouble between the 
two companies. No. Si's boys had really "got enough." 

Shortly afterwards, " Dave " Broderick went to Cali- 
fornia, where, after a career of political success in which 
he became United States Senator from that State, he was 
bullied into a duel with Judge Terry, who killed him; 
while Ely Hazelton, elated at his victory, soon after took to 
drinking, and one night, in a fit of mania a j)otu^ committed 
suicide in a shockingly original manner, taking an awl and 
driving it with a mallet into his brain. 

So much for Chief Decker's description of an incident of 
Volunteer Fire Department days ; and now for a word or 
two about his illustrious predecessor, Harry Howard. 

Harry was a bluff, somewhat stern, but always good- 
natured fellow, and gentlemanly in deportment. He never 
knew who his parents were. A kind-hearted old woman 
adopted him in infancy, and the Legislature, at his request, 
gave him his name, which was Henry H. Howard. He 
never married, but he seems to have had somewhere in his 
inner heart a soft spot for some one ; for, when he died, he 
bequeathed all his property to a lady whom, as stated by a 
friend of his, he had " loved and lost " in his youth. Be- 



78 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

cause lie was of unknown parentage, the parents of the girl 
he loved would not consent to her union with him, and she 
was wedded to another. But, he doubtless argued, it was 
through no fault of hers that she did not become his wife, 
and, having no relatives, he left her all he had in this world, 
thus exemplifying Moore's beautiful stanza : 

" The heart that has truly loved never forgets, 

But as truly loves on to the close 
As the sun-flower turns to her god when he sets 

The same look which she turned when he rose." 

Kotwithstanding his romance, there was a good deal of 
human nature in Harry's composition, and while he did not 
indulge much in conversation, he was " up to snuff " in 
matters political. His first start in politics was during the 
" hasty plate of soup '' canvass of General "Winfield Scott, 
in 1852, when Harry (while an Assistant Engineer of the 
Department) was elected to the Legislature, and served dur- 
ing the session of 1853. Then, following in the footsteps of 
Tweed, he took a turn at city politics, and held the position 
of Alderman during the years 185-1 and 1855 ; John Kelly, 
afterwards " Boss " of Tammany Hall, being an associate 
member with him. Harry then made a dash for the office 
of Receiver of Taxes ; and this is the way " he got there." 
It happened that, just as Harry's term as Alderman was about 
to expire, Mr. Harvey Hart's term of office as Receiver of 
Taxes was also brought to a close. Harry concluded that he 
would interview the Mayor (Fernando Wood) who had the 
authority, " by and with the consent of the Board of Alder- 
men," to fill the office of Receiver of Taxes. Wood's per- 
sonal preference for the soon-to-be vacancy was Daniel E. 
Delavan, a Sachem of Tammany, and an admirer of Fer- 
nando Wood. But Wood was a sly politician, and not 
wishing to offend Harry Howard and his following, pre- 
tended to be friendly with Harry and in favor of his pro- 
motion. " Only," said he to Harry, " it would be a waste 



THE OLD CHIEF'S SIULL AS A POLITICIAN. 79 

of time to nominate you, as your brother Aldermen, jealous 
of jour personal popularity, would not confirm your nomi- 
nation." 

Howard, not to be put off tlius easily, replied to Mayor 
Wood's sympathetic suggestion by saying : " Any way, give 
me the nomination, Mr. Mayor, Let me have it signed by 
jou officially, and I will try my luck with the Aldermen. 
Do your part, and then, if the Aldermen won't have me, 
why, you will have shown your friendship to me, and I and 
the members of the Fire Department won't forget you 
hereafter." 

" Not a bad idea that of yours, Harry," said the Mayor. 
" I rather like it. Call to-morrow, and I will have your 
nomination made out and signed, all ready to submit to the 
Board of Aldermen. Good day," and His Honor bowed 
Harry Howard out, with one of his sweetest Fernando 
Wooden styles of smile. 

This was in the morning. That very afternoon. Wood 
had a secret meeting with certain prominent members of 
the Board of Aldermen, and exacted a promise from them 
not to confirm Harry Howard's nomination which he, for 
policy's sake, might send to them. Then, thinking that he 
had very effectually cooked Howard's " goose," His Honor 
went up town. 

Next day, Wood gave Harry a duplicate copy of his 
nomination fur the position of Receiver of Taxes, the 
original of which he promised to send to the Board of 
Aldermen in an official way. " You see, Harry," said his 
Honor, as he handed Howard the precious document, "I 
have kept my word ; and I do hope that I may be agree- 
ably disappointed in my conviction that the Board of Alder- 
men will refuse to endorse my nomination of you." 

Whereupon Harry Howard smiled ; so did his Honor the 
Mayor. Everything was lovely all around, and with mutual 
" taffy " the two politicians separated, the Mayor chuskling 



80 THIRTY YEARS OF NEJV YORK POLITICS. 

as lie thought of the block game he had arranged. But, if 
Wood was playing smart, Harry was going to try to play 
smarter. He knew all about "Wood's preference for Delavan, 
and he had also found out the night before concerning 
"Wood's secret caucus with the Aldermen. So, with the 
Mayor's nomination in his pocket, he made his way to the 
room of the Clerk of the Common Council, where he 
chanced to meet several members of the Board. 

It so happened at this time that the majority of the mem- 
bers of the Board of Aldermen were not very friendly to 
the Mayor, because he had just succeeded in fooling them 
in a characteristic way. Some weeks before, "Wood had got 
the Board to confirm his nomination of Charles Devlin as 
Street Commissioner. "Wood had distinctly promised them 
that, if they would promptly confirm Devlin's nomination, 
he would allow them to divide up among themselves all 
his patronage. But, instead of his doing so, as promised, the 
Aldermen got nothing ; and they felt quite sore about such 
treatment. 

" If I show you a way to get even with "Wood, will you 
have spunk enough to follow it ? " asked Harry of his fellow 
members whom he had met. Receiving an affirmative assur- 
ance he continued : " Well, I have asked Wood to nominate 
me for Beceiver of Taxes, and he has got some of you fel- 
lows to promise to reject my nomination. Now, what I 
suggest is that you go back on your promises to the Mayor, 
the same as he went back on his promises to you concerning 
Charley Devlin. And by confirming my nomination as 
Eeceiver, you will keep Wood from getting his man 
Delavan in." 

His Brother Aldermen thought the plan suggested was a 
good one, and shaking Harry's hand cordially and promising 
him their support, the party separated, Harry determining 
to follow up his success with other conferences of a similar 



GETTING THE BEST OP A DOUBLE-DfiALER. M 

kind, tKe understanding being, however, that " mum " must 
be the word. 

A few days afterwards there was a regular meeting of the 
Aldermen in their chamber, and there was a pretty full 
house, including a number of local politicians, the under- 
standing being that Harry Howard's name was to be sent in 
as Receiver of Taxes, and his friends were pi-esent in force. 
Daniel E. Delavan was there also, with a party of friends, 
and they seemed to be in the best of humor, the Mayor 
having doubtless told them how Harry was going to be 
"fooled." The Aldermen smiled, too, because they had an 
idea also that somebody else was also going to be " fooled." 

Presently, in came the Mayor's clerk with a communica- 
tion, which was handed to the President of the Board. 
Harry stood close by, with his duplicate nomination in his 
hand, which he had determined to present, in case Wood 
should attempt " foxy " business. But, so confident was 
Wood of Harry's rejection, that he had actually kept faith; 
and Howard's name was in the transmitted message as 
nominee for the ofBce of Receiver of Taxes. 

Sufiice it to add that, when the communication from His 
Honor the Mayor was read, on the call of the ayes and nays 
all the members of the Board present — except two of the 
three men the Mayor had talked to, and upon whom he had 
relied to control the Board — voted to confirm Howard's 
nomination. 

And Mayor Wood, having run against a buzz saw in trying 
to fool Harry, was terribly mortified to think that he had 
kept his word — a very unusual thing, in politics, for him to 
do — and he lost much prestige in the estimation of his 
friend Daniel E. Delavan, the disappointed aspirant and the 
Mayor's own choice for the oflSce of Receiver of Taxes. 

In conclusion, I may mention that a relic of the days of 
the Volunteer Fire Department, a bell tower, from the top 
of which is suspended the bell which used to summon tho 



82 tHIRTY YRAtlS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

firemen of the Harlem district to duty, still stands on tlie 
summit of a liill in the centre of Mount Morris Park, and 
three times a day (at eight o'clock a. m., at noon, and at nine 
o'clock at night) a member of our Fire Department strikes 
the hour on the bell, the ^abrant tones of which awaken 
pleasant memories in the minds of many old Volunteer 
Firemen residing in the vicinity. The site of Mount Morris 
Park, then a barren waste of twenty acres, was in 1837, 
donated by a widow named Bell to the public of !N"ew York. 
The value of the bequest at that time was one thousand 
dollars. The present estimated value is one and a quarter 
millions of dollars. 



LETTER yill. 

Distinguished Lobbyists at Albany— Originator in this 
State of the Third House— Skilled Diplomats and 
Their Successful Manceuvres— A Coup d'Etat in the 
State Senate — Adroitness of a Member in Turning a 
Sharp Corner — Important Bridge Contest Between 
Albany and Troy— How a Cute Lobbyist on a Losing 
Side Turned up a Winner— Apparently Trivial In- 
cident that Changed the Course op an Important 
Measure. 

My dear Dean: 

I I now desire to direct attention once more to Albany, 
and give yoii some idea of the surroundings of members of 
the Legislature at the period referred to in a preceding 
letter— the years 1868-69. 

Lobbying at Albany, according to all accounts, was first 
successfully introduced in 1825 by Thurlow "Weed, who, 
although not a professional lobbyist in the modern sense of 
that term, was a most influential " manager " of legislation 
and '' the noblest Roman of them all." For a period of 
forty years Mr. Weed held the position of undisputed leader 
of his party in New York State. He had " made " his 
friend William H. Seward Governor of the State, and, later, 
influenced the selection of Mr. Seward for the onerous post 
of Secretary of State in President Lincoln s Cabinet. 

Inasmuch as in his earlier days there were comparatively 
few large corporations to tamper with legislation, Mr. 
Weed's stock in trade was chiefly ''persuasive eloquence." 
He was a born diplomat, an adroit manager, and the very 
head and front of the old Whig party, as of its successor, 
the Republican. The rural legislator of his own political 
faith always looked to him for advice concerning aifairs of 
State, and the Albany Evening Journal was his mouth- 



84 "riilRTY YEARS OF KEW YORK POLITIC^. 

piece ; wliile tlie Democratic organ at Albany was then, as 
now, the Argus, through which Dean Richmond, Peter 
Cagger, Sanford E. Church, and others of the " Albany 
Regency " formulated their political views. 

After forty years of active service as •'' a manager of legis- 
lation," as he expressed it, Thurlow Weed retired with an 
honorable record from the field of his exploits. Then to 
the front came those who desired to till the field he had so 
successfully ploughed ; who had, like busy bees, " improved 
each shining hour," and become adepts in one of his lines of 
" statesmanship." 

Most polished and advanced of Weed's successors, a man 
of culture and of quick perceptions, was A. D. Barber. As 
there was in the European politics of his time only one 
Bismarck, so in the annals of the Albany lobby there was 
only one Barber, of whom it might well be said, " none but 
himself could be his parallel." He was a wonderful man 
in his way. He looked a good deal like Judge Noah Davis, 
(the Judge who sentenced Tweed to twelve years' imprison- 
ment on as many different " counts" and had his decision 
reversed by the Court of Appeals) and to whom, by the 
way, he was related. He was averse to ostentation, vulgar 
display or fuss ; was smart, nervy and reliable, and, like 
Tweed, (in one respect at least) he was big-hearted, and 
often by stealth did a good action which nobody ever gave 
him credit for. Like Tweed, too, he was direct in his 
methods, and, if he wanted a man or a thing, went directly 
for the thing or the man. He could pass or kill a bill 
quicker than could any other man in his time or line. He 
generally preferred killing bills to passing them, however, 
because he found " Nay " votes cheaper than " Yea" votes, 
and easier to get. Barber was King of the Lobby for a 
long series of years. Then he^ somehow got mixed up in 
the Conkliug and anti-Conkling fight, at the time when 
Roscoe Conkling and his then associate, Thomas C. Piatt, 



FAMOUS MEMBERS OF THE THIRD HOUSE. 85 

resigned their seats in the Federal Senate and sought re- 
election as a rebuke to President James A. Garfield, whom 
they had tried to boss in the matter of the appointment of 
Judge William H. Robertson as Collector of the Port of 
T^ew York — to which I shall refer more fully hereafter. It 
was a matter not directly in Barber's line, but he tried to 
" take it in," and was taken in by it. He nearly got into 
" trouble " on account of this affair, and then, quarreling 
with a somewhat ambitious lobbyist, known as Edward 
Phelps, abdicated his throne and retired from the scene of 
his glory. 

Barber's successor, Phelps, was a very agreeable and 
companionable man, and at the same time somewhat digni- 
fied. He had a most useful faculty for a man in his line ; 
he never forgot a face, just as he never remembered a con- 
versation — unless there was good reason for doing other- 
wise. He was one of the keenest, smartest men living, 
and scored a notable success in his chosen avocation. 

Mr. Phelps made a specialty of " business " for the New 
York Central Railroad, and this he managed with remark- 
able skill. He was sagacious in his valuation of votes, 
honorable and straightforward in his dealings with his 
" clients," and satisfactory to his principals, who could place 
firm reliance upon all his statements. The briefest memo- 
randum over his signature was regarded by members of 
both Houses as good as a bond. But on one occasion his 
keen desire to save his Yanderbilt friends from what he 
thought unnecessary expense came very near getting him 
into a mess of tribulation. Prior to the adoption of the 
amended Constitution of this State there was set before 
the Senate an innocent-looking bill — which had been 
shrewdly shaped as a local measure applicable only to an 
unimportant railroad in the interior of the State, but which 
sought to amend the General Railroad Act in a way that 
would be very advantageous to the New York Central, 



SC THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

although the name of that corporation was not visibly con- 
nected with the bill. So well was the object of the meas- 
ure cloaked that Phelps concluded he could run it tlirough 
the Legislature on what the wide-awake members called 
" the dead sneak " — a term which they applied to the pass- 
age of any bill which had " business" in it, but for which 
no " business " was transacted. Among the Senators was 
one very wide awake chap, a bright lawyer, a fine debater, 
and a very industrious member. Scarcely a printed bill 
was ever placed on the files (with which every member 
was supplied and which were generally kept on their desks 
for easy reference when bills were up for discussion) that 
he did not read, and when he read them he made memo- 
randa of what they contained. The "nigger in the fence" 
of the New York Central's innocent looking " little local 
bill " did not escape his notice. Every time he scanned 
his memorandum-book, which he carried in the inside 
pocket of his business coat, he would be reminded of the 
measure, and then he would give it another reading. One 
day when, in the ordinary course of its business, the Senate 
had reached " General Orders " (in which bills in their 
order are taken up for discussion in Committee of the 
Whole), the clerk began to read by sections this innocent- 
looking " little local bill." 

Senator Nickleson (the industrious member just referred 
to) sat perfectly still until the clerk had read all but the 
last section of the bill ; and as there seemed to be no oppo- 
sition to the measure, Mr. Phelps, who sat in one corner of 
the Senate Chamber, was congratulating himself upon the 
success of his shrewd device, and was about to go and tele- 
graph the New York Central people the fine progress the 
bill was making, when suddenly Senator Nickleson arose 
from his seat and said : " Mr. President, in order to receive 
some expLanation of the aim and object of the fourth sec- 
tion of this bill, I was about to make a motion to strike 



CUNNING LOBBYIST AND CUTE LEGISLATOR. 87 

out its enacting clause ; but as I observe that the Senator 
who introduced the bill is not in his seat, I shall, instead, 
move that when the Committee rises, it reports progress on 
this bill, and ask leave to sit again." Out of courtesy to 
the Senator, his motion was seconded and carried. 

During the afternoon recess, the Senator was waited 
upon bj Mr. Phelps, who in a sympathetic way asked why 
he was so unkind as to interfere with a little local bill of a 
brother Senator who was lying sick at his hotel. Then 
Senator Nickleson explained his suspicions concerning the 
measure, and stated that he was opposed to it, as the fourth 
section "covered a multitude of sin.-,." Phelps pooh- 
poohed this idea, and insisted that th jre was nothing wrong 
in the bill. 

" All right," replied the Senator, " we shall see what we 
shall see. I, know what I'm about." 

When the bill came up again for discussion in Commit- 
tee of the Whole, Phelps occupied a seat in the rear of tlie 
Senate Chamber, alongside of a prominent official of the 
New York Central Railroad. And when the clerk had 
again by request read the fourth section of the bill, its 
introducer then being present, Senator Nickleson made a 
motion to " strike out the enacting clause," and proceeded 
to expose in great style the " inside " of the bill. Suddenly 
there was a conference between Phelps and the railroad 
official, which ended in Mr. Phelps leaving the Senate 
Chamber, going to the library, and, upon his return, sum- 
moning one of the pages, whom he instructed to deliver a 
memorandum to Senator Nickleson. That gentleman 
paused in his remarks long enough to glance at the mes- 
sage, whereupon his hand went to the inside pocket of his 
coat, as if in search of a particular letter, which he opened 
and read a few lines ; then, continuing his remarks, he 
said: 

" Mr. Chairman, I have spoken as I have concerning 



88 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

this bill, not because of my opposition to it, but in obedi- 
ence to a request of one of my constituents, whose opinions 
I highly respect, and in fulfillment of my response to his 
letter, which I hold in my hand. I promised him to pre- 
sent to the Senate his objections ; and have done so. But 
I am convinced, after due and careful investigation of the 
bill, that my friend errs in his conclusions, and I must and 
shall differ from him in my action. Therefore I beg leave 
to withdraw my motion to strike out the enacting clause 
of the bill, and, if the Senator from the Eighteenth Dis- 
trict will permit me, I now move that when this Com- 
mittee rises, it reports this bill to the Senate and recom- 
mends its passage." 

This sudden change of base on the part of the Senator 
was so adroitly managed, and was characterized by such 
apparent sincerity, that it excited no comment ; but anyone 
who watched the manoeuvre, as I did, might have noticed 
a nod of gratified approval to Mr. Phelps on the part of the 
railroad ofiicial. The bill was reported favorably to the 
Senate, subsequently passed both Houses, and became a law. 
But for Mr. Phelps's " fine work " its fate might have been 
entirely different. The memorandum had " a power of in- 
fluence," and the result proved Phelps to be a diplomat 
equal to any emergency. He was satisfied for ever after 
that Senator Nickleson " knew a good thing when he saw 
it," and the promoter never failed to " consult " the Sen- 
ator regarding all important measures under his control. 

One of the most sagacious lobbyists — or, more properly 
speaking, co-operators in the noble arts of the Third House 
— during the successful reign of Phelps, was James Davis 
whose strong point was his intimacy with Chester A. Arthur 
long before Arthur became President and while he was as 
much a " Boss " in the Republican party as was Tweed in 
Tammany Hall. " Jimmy " was a fine story-teller, and had 
a free-and-easy way that " took " with the members of the 



Adroit peomoters of "business" bills. sd 

Legislature. President Arthur never " went back " on his 
friends, and after he reached the Wliite House he still 
treated his friend Davis cordially ; but, on the whole, 
" Jimmy " proved worthy of the President's intimacy, and 
did not abuse it. 

But, perhaps, all in all, the most gentlemanly, most intel- 
lectual, genial and popular man, next to Thurlow Weed, 
who had anything to do with the Albany lobby, was Hugh 
Hastings, between whom and Weed there was a feeling of 
sincere attachment. Hastings was the truest of friends and 
the bitterest of enemies. For many years after he left 
Albany, he was the editor of the New York Commercial 
Advertiser^ and was the author of a valuable book on 
" Ancient American Politics." 

Effulgent as were these lights of the lobby whom I have 
enumerated, Lorenzo Sessions, (better known throughout 
the length and breadth of the State as " Lo " Sessions) who 
began his political life as a member of the Third House^ 
and terminated his career as a State Senator, was " no 
slouch." 

" Lo " was a very handsome man, big-framed, bright- 
eyed, with a fine head of hair, a still finer goatee, and 
wore what the lady novelists style "a perennial smile." 
His first job as a lobbyist was connected with the old Albany 
Bridge Bill, in which Dean Richmond and Thurlow Weed 
had a hand. Weed offered Sessions a " retainer " to work 
for the bill, but the Troy people (who then possessed a 
monopoly of the Hudson Piver, in so far as a bridge was 
concerned ; for, less than thirty years ago, the only way of 
getting from New York City to Albany, except by steam- 
boats, was to cross the river at Castleton by ferryboat in 
Summer, and by sleighs in Winter) were jealous of Albany 
and intensely hostile to this bridge project. To " Lo," ac- 
cordingly, was offered a somewhat larger " retainer " if he 
would join their side in the contest. " Lo " Sessions was 



90 THIRTY YEARS Oi' NEW YORK POLITICS. 

not the man to fly in the face of Providence ; he was not 
blind to bread and bntter. Does not a text say that " he 
that provideth not for his own house is worse than an in- 
fidel ? " And " Lo " had a family. So, from motives 
deep-rooted in domestic economy, he epoused that side of 
the bill represented by the largest pecuniary benefit to 
those for whom he had to provide. He undertook to beat 
the bill ; and he got a snug check for opposing it — a check 
made out on the very day when the fate of the project was 
in' the balance before the Legislature, '"Lo's" special mis- 
sion being to snatch from the friends of the bill three As- 
semblymen from his locality over whom he was supposed 
to have strong influence. 

From accurate knowledge of the party with whom he 
was dealing, " Lo " knew, when he took this check (it was 
for a round one thousand dollars) that it would never be 
paid, nor one dollar of it, if the bill passed ; and before three 
o'clock that day, he made up his mind that the bill 
would pass, notwithstanding his efforts to the contrary. 
Dean Richmond himself, then President of the New York 
Central Railroad, was in Albany, using "arguments" 
freely. The whole power of the road was backing up the 
bill, and " Lo " began to regret that he had not enlisted on 
the other side of the fight, and gotten a smaller certainty 
rather than a larger uncertainty. " Lo," however, was not 
the man to sigh over a mistake, but to rectify it, or, failing, 
then to play what there was in it for all that it was worth. 
And he reasoned to himself that the only thing for him 
now — at this stage of uncertainty — was to get, by hook or 
crook, that one thousand dollar check cashed and the money 
in his pocket, whether the Bridge Bill passed or not, and, if 
possible, before any " private instructions " were received 
by the bank cashier about the check aforesaid. 

It so happened that no "private instructions" had been 
given concerning that check, for the simple reason that the 



HOAV DIAMOND CUT DIAMOND. &1 

man who drew it and handed it to Sessions thought he had 
a sure thing — not on the bill, but on the check ; for the 
check had been drawn on a Troy bank, and had not been 
delivered to '' Lo " until about two o'clock, just as the 
Legislature had taken a recess, the calculation of the man 
who gave it being that, as the bank closed at three o'clock. 
Sessions, who had a lot of other business on hand, could 
not possibly get it cashed that day, and perhaps before the 
next morning the fate of the bill and of the check would be 
decided together. If the bill passed, why — the check 
wouldn't ! 

But Sessions, as I have intimated, was " no slouch." He 
knew the cashier of the Troy bank ; he also knew all about 
the time-tables of the local trains, and knew that, according 
to the schedule, he could not possibly make a train to Troy 
by three o'clock ; but, besides all this, he know the pro- 
prietor of a livery stable near by of whom he could get an 
A-ISTo. 1 fast saddle horse, which might be able to carry him 
to Troy before the bank closed. " Lo" got that horse ; and 
Phil Sheridan's famous ride from Winchester was a tame 
record as compared with " Lo's " electric flight to Troy, ten 
miles away, on the day in question. When he reached the 
bank it was closed ! Li " nil desperandum " mood he 
banged at the door until it was oj)ened by an attendant 
who, knowing "Lo" personally, and the cashier also being 
a personal friend of Sessions, let him enter. One of the 
strong points about " Lo " was that he knew everybody 
that was anybody, and was popular with all his acquaint- 
ances. 

"Jim," exclaimed Sessions, addressing the cashier, who 
had recognized him as he entered, " I have a check here 
that I must get cashed at once." 

Taking the check and glancing at the signature, the 
cashier said it was all right. " But what on earth are you 



da THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

in such a hiirrj for ?" lie asked. " Can't you wait for the 
money until morning ?" 

"No, Jim," replied Sessions, " I cannot wait for the 
money until morning, for several good reasons. You see," 
he added, tapping the cashier on the shoulder, and giving 
him a sly wink, " at least three-quarters of this amount is 
for ' business ' of immediate, urgent necessity, and belongs 
to the boys ; besides, I have arranged for a little game at 
the Delavan to-night, and I cannot afford to be without 
some spot cash. You comprehend, Jim ?" 

While conspicuously faithful and conscientious, the 
cashier was human enough to dearly like a " little game " 
himself; always paid his bets cash down, and expected 
others in the same way to pay theirs ; fully comprehended 
" Lo's " position, as explained, and made no further delay 
in cashing the check ; whereupon " Lo," thanking the 
cashier, i-emounted his horse, and, with the air of a con- 
quering hero, rode leisurely back to Albany. 

Meanwhile, the man who had given Sessions the check, 
although he did not dream of what " Lo " had been doing, 
decided (lest he might forget it in the morning) not to put 
off till the morrow what could be done that day. He pre- 
pared to run over to Troy and stop payment on the check, 
at least until '' dead sure " of the defeat of the Bridge Bill. 
Jumping on the first local train to Troy, and going to the 
door of the bank, in which he was a large depositor, he 
knocked as " Lo " had done, and, like " Lo," was ad- 
mitted. 

So far, so good. But it was not so good when, to his 
utter astonishment, the visitor found that he had been fore- 
stalled, and that the money had been paid. He " swore 
some " then, but not nearly as much as he did the next day 
when the Bridge bill, having already passed the Senate, re- 
ceived a favorable third reading in the Assembly. And 1 
when in the lobby of the Delavan after the bill had passed 1 



A TIMELY LETTER OF INTRODUCTION. 93 

the House, the man who gave the check met the man who 
received it, neither asked the other to "take a drink." 

From that time forth, " Lo " Sessions was recognized as 
one of the smartest members of the lobby, and no one en- 
joyed hearing more than he enjoyed telling the story of 
how he "got the best of a skin." 

As in this letter I have referred to Thiirlow "Weed, I 
may add, in order to prove that he was no common lobby- 
ist, that, during the early part of the Civil War, he was 
appointed one of three commissioners to visit London and 
Paris to endeavor to prevent any interference, on the part 
of the English or French governments, in the quarrel be- 
tween the IS^orth and South. His colleagues in that mission 
were Archbishop Hughes and Bishop Mcllvaine. 

Just before leaving New York (and I obtained this in- 
formation from his particular friend, Mr, Hugh Hastings) 
Thurlow Weed met accidentally a friend who, in the course 
of conversation, said he knew in Paris a certain French 
merchant who had formerly done business in New York, 
and Thurlow Weed immediately asked this friend to sit 
down and write for him a letter of introduction to the 
French merchant, as he would like to meet an influential 
gentleman in Paris who had resided in New York, 

The three Commissioners left New York on the same 
steamer. Bishop McHvaine visited London, but made 
poor headway, and soon returned disappointed. Archbishop 
Hughes tried to see Napoleon, but did not succeed ; and 
he went to Italy to consult the Pope, Thurlow Weed 
found himself all alone in Paris. 

Meanwhile, the French Emperor, to whom overtures had 
been made by the Confederate Commissioners, was more 
than half-inclined to take a hostile attitude toward the 
Northern States, and was only waiting for the co-operation 
of England. Thurlow Weed knew all this, and fruitlessly 
tried in every way to get a personal interview with the 



94 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Emperor. The Americau envoy was almost reduced to 
despair when suddenly he bethought him of the ex-New 
York French merchant in Paris, to whom he bore tlie letter 
of introduction. He at once hunted him up and presented 
this letter. He was well-received, and found, to his in- 
tense delight, that this French merchant was of good stand- 
ing at the Imperial Court, that he had placed the Emperor 
himself under obligations, and that he was on equally good 
terms with the Due de Morny, another very important per- 
sonage at that particular time. 

Having had several talks together regarding the situation, 
the Frenchman advised the American Commissioner that 
the best way to accomplish his purpose of obtaining the 
much coveted interview with the Emperor, was to get at 
him, as it were, by installments. In other words, that he 
should first call on Prince jSTapoleon, then on the Due de 
Morny, and then upon the Emperor ; the merchant promis- 
ing Weed to pave the way for him to all three. This ad- 
vice Thurlow "Weed fully carried out, with such success 
that in a very short time the attitude of France toward the 
United States was completely changed. 

This incident strikingly attests the truth of the axiom 
that " there are no such things as little things." For, if 
Napoleon had not changed his course at about the period 
referred to, both France and England might soon have 
been induced to recognize the independence of the South- 
ern Confederacy ; and Napoleon, perhaps, might not have 
changed his course had he not been reached in the diplo- 
matic way suggested by the French merchant, whom Weed 
would not have known or would have been unable to reach 
had it not been for the very warm letter of introduction 
obtained from the friend accidentally met before leaving 
New York. From which chain of premises I shall leave 
you to draw your own conclusions. 




(Kedrawu from Harper's Magazine. By permission. Copyright, IsrJ, by Harper & Brothers.) 

Peter B. Ssveeny. 



LETTER IX. 

Pluck Displayed by Tweed in His Early Political Career 
— How He Combated the Omnibus Monopoly — What It 
Cost Thirteen Aldermen to Disregard an Injunction — 
Thirty Years' of Incessant Struggle for a Broadway 
Railroad— Sad Fate of the Original Projector — Pub- 
lic Clamor and Its Victims — How a Washington Boss 
WAS Hounded Almost to Death ; Then Applauded as a 
Hero, and an Ovatton Extended to Him, 

My dear Dean : 

In my last letter I devoted some space to the intricacies 
of railway legislation in this State, and while this subject 
is in my mind, I may refer to a local controversy in which 
Boss Tweed, in his earlier days, was interested, and at a 
time when he did not have so much control over our Judges 
as at a later period. In this connection, permit me here to 
say, that in these familiar letters it is my purpose to do 
equal and exact justice to all to whom I may refer — to 
Tweed as well as everybody else ; for my aim is to 
" nothing extenuate, nor set down aught in malice." 

Those who now visit New York and have occasion to 
ride in the handsomely-constructed, spacious, electric cars, 
which pass and repass the promenader on Broadway at in- 
tervals of less than half a minute, can scarcely believe that 
it required nearly thirty years of hard fighting to so over- 
come the bitter opposition set up against what waS'Called 
" the desecration " of Broadway by railway tracks, as to 
secure the accommodations we have to-day ; and you will 
perhaps be surprised to learn that William M. Tweed, as far 
back as the year 1852, had the foresight and sagacity to per- 
ceive the necessity of supplanting the then existing old omni- 
bus system of transit with some more rapid and progressive 

95 



t)6 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS- 

means of public transportation on the principal tliorougli- 
fare of the city, and that, boldly defying an act of injunc- 
tion, he then ran the risk of "contempt" proceedings in 
his efforts to secure to his fellow citizens the advantages of 
better local transit which they demanded. 

In December, 1852, after a long discussion, and despite 
strenuous opposition on the part of the proprietors of the 
several omnibus lines (there were at that time over five 
hundred stages belonging to the several lines in daily use 
on Broadway, which were an abomination to the men 
women and children who were compelled to ride in them,) 
the Board of Aldermen resolved to " grant permission to 
Jacob Sharp and others to lay a railroad track on Broad- 
way, from South Ferry to Fifty-ninth Street," the ordinance 
being adopted by a vote of sixteen ayes to two nays. 
This action of the Board of Aldermen was vetoed by the 
Mayor, Ambrose C. Kingsland, and as there was much 
popular indignation thereat, and some talk of the passage, 
by the Aldermen, of the ordinance over the Mayor's veto^ 
resort was had to the Courts by the opponents of the meas, 
ure (among whom, besides the stage proprietors, was Alex- 
ander T. Stewart, the " merchant prince," who was then 
catering to Fifth Avenue custom, and was afraid that a 
railroad on Broadway would interfere with the carriages 
of his customers,) and an injunction was issued by Justice 
Campbell, of the Superior Court, to restrain such action 
by the Board. 

This proceeding irritated the Aldermen, of whom Richard 
F. Cotnpton was then president, and at a meeting of the 
Board, held on the 28th of December (within three days of 
the close of the session) Alderman Sturtevant offered a pre- 
amble and resolution, reciting the fact I have just stated, 
adding that "if the assumption be submitted to, that a 
Judge, without color of law or jurisdiction, can exercise 
the prerogative of directing and controlling municipal legis- 



CONFLICT OF ALDERMANIC AND JUDICIAL AUTHORITY. 97 

lation of the City, by issuing an injunction prohibiting the 
Mayor, Aldermen and Commonalty of New York from 
performing a legislative act supposed by him to be probably 
about to be performed, the next natural step of judicial 
usurpation will be to arrest and veto, in similar manner, the 
legislation of the State or that of Congress on any Judge's 
opinion of constitutionality, expediency or motive, at the 
close of a session when all business of importance is usually 
completed." The preamble further claimed that the " Com- 
mon Council have an equal authority and right to suspect 
and impute improper motives to any intended judicial de- 
cision of any Judge, and consequently arrest his action on 
the Bench, as such Judge has in regard to the legislative 
action of the Common Council." The preamble and reso- 
lution still further asserted that " the measure against which 
the injunction in question is directed, was adopted on the 
grounds of public expediency, justice and right, for the 
good of the city, both in regard to accommodation and 
service of the public, and in regard to the interests of the 
City Treasury, and also upon the petition of upwards of 
thirty thousand citizens ; that nothing has yet appeared 
which shakes the ground on which the ordinance was 
adopted, and that we shrink from no discussion or investi- 
gation, judicial or otherwise, into the foundations of these 
grounds and the reason of our action, collective and indi- 
vidual." 

Alderman Tweed, in seconding the preamble and resolu- 
tion, argued that the terms and conditions imposed upon the 
grantees of the proposed franchise were calculated to be 
of undoubted public advantage, and would insure the 
growth and progress of the city, as well as be a great 
accommodation to the working classes, and closed by stating 
that " when the people of the Seventh Ward elected him 
as their representative, they gave him the right to think for 
them, and had not delegated it to Mr. Justice Campbell ; 



98 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and lie would never allow Mr. Campbell or Mr, Anybody 
Else to direct him how to think or vote, but would do so 
himself, despite injunctions or any other papers." 

The preamble and resolutions offered by Mr. Sturtevant 
were then approved by a vote of thirteen ayes to four 
nays, and the ordinance previously adopted granting the 
franchise for a railroad on Broadway to Jacob Sharp and 
others was passed, " notwithstanding the objections of the 
Mayor," by a vote of fifteen ayes to three nays. 

The Board of Aldermen met again the next day for the 
transaction of regular business, and this was the last session 
of the year. 

It may be worth while to mention, in this connection, 
that the Board of Aldermen in 1852 was composed of very 
different material from the class of men who have figured 
in it since the pay of Aldermen was fixed at two thousand 
dollars per annum. In 1852 there was no compensation of 
the Aldermen ; they served for the honor of the position. 
The Board which Mr. Justice Campbell had enjoined con- 
sisted of Messrs. Bichard F. Compton, ice merchant ; Abra- 
ham Moore, retired merchant ; Oscar W. Sturtevant, law- 
yer ; Jacob T. Oakley, liquor dealer ; Dudley Haley, fruit 
dealer; John Boy ce, dry goods merchant ; Thomas J. Barr, 
livery stable proprietor; William M. Tweed, chair manu- 
facturer ; William J. Brisley, marble and stone cutter; 
Charles Francis, saddler ; Wesley Smith, dealer in timber ; 
John Pearsall, retired merchant ; Daniel F. Tiemann (after- 
wards Mayor of the city), paints and oils ; James M. Bard, 
brass founder ; A. A. Den man, building materials ; John 
Doherty, lawyer ; William J. Peck, lime and brick dealer ; 
S. L. II. Ward, lawyer ; W. II. Cornell, butcher ; A. A. 
Alvord, insurance broker. 

The result of the injunction of the Court to which I have 
referred was that the people got no Broadway Railroad ; 
but Alderman Sturtevant was sentenced to twenty days in 



A VICTIM OF "CONTEMPT" PROCEEDINGS. 99 

the city prison and to pay a fine of two hundred and fifty 
dollars for his share of the " contempt " of Court in which 
he had indulged, while all of his brother Aldermen who 
voted for his preamble and resolution, including Alderman 
William M. Tweed, were fined two hundred dollars apiece. 
Then the stage proprietors, aided by Mr. A. T. Stewart and 
others, hoping thereby the better to " protect Broadway 
against railway cars," lobbied at Albany and had the power 
of granting railroad franchises taken away from the Alder- 
men and lodged in the State Legislature. 

It is stated that A. T. Stewart expended nearly half a 
million of dollars, during a period of twenty-five years, to 
defeat the various attempts to run a railroad past the two 
immense dry goods establishments which he then owned on 
Broadway. Nothing could change him when he once made 
up his mind, and to the day of his death he almost foamed 
at the mouth at the mere mention of a Broadway Railroad 
or "Jake" Sharp. 

As for Alderman Sturtevant, a promising lawyer and a 
gentleman highly respected, the disgrace of imprisonment 
for sustaining (as he contended) the dignity of a representa- 
tive, preyed upon his mind. He did not care for the fine 
inflicted upon him — he was willing to pay, if necessary, ten 
times the amount; but to be treated like a felon was a 
bitter pill. It indirectly killed him. From the day he 
came out of jail he was a broken-down man. His family 
and friends did all they could to cheer him ; told him that 
his punishment was merely due to political antagonisms, 
which was more than half true ; but he persisted in looking 
at it as if it involved personal disgrace. He got solitary in 
his habits, avoided his fellow men, and one day, while 
brooding and worrying, fell dead in the lobby of the Astor 
House, a victim to his righteous endeavor to serve the 
public in giving them a railway on Broadway. 

But while Jacob Sharp was thus defeated in his first 



100 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

attempt to obtain from the Aldermen a franchise for a 
Broadway railroad, he followed up the matter, year after 
year, with bills introduced in the State Legislature, always 
to be defeated, however, through the " influence " of Mr. 
A. T. Stewart, until after years of fruitless perseverance at 
Albany (always, as I have stated, confronted by the Broad- 
way millionaire's money-bags), he had about made up his 
mind to " throw up the sponge," when his hopes were re- 
vived by the passage of a bill restoring to the City govern- 
ment the right of granting franchises for surface railroads. 
Then the pioneer of that great enterprise set himself 
earnestly to work once more, and he again presented a 
petition to the Board of Aldermen in favor of his darling 
project. His old antagonist, A. T. Stewart, was now no 
longer living ; but a new enemy, in the shape of a rival as- 
pirant for the franchise, came to the front. 

Being a sensible and proper project from the start, and 
one which long ago would have added millions in value to 
property on that thoroughfare, had not blind obstinacy pre- 
vented, the Broadway Railroad idea " grew by what it fed 
on;" a syndicate of railroad men in Philadelphia became 
interested in it ; and patient, persistent Jacob Sharp soon 
became convinced that, if he could not call to his aid 
moneyed friends, he, in spite of all his years of toil and the 
large expenditures he had incurred to secure the consum- 
mation of his hopes, would, in the classic language of the 
Aldermen of the year 1884, be " given the grand goose," 
or in plainer language be left out in the cold. So he 
interested on his side, in the fight for the franchise, the 
Seventh Avenue Railroad Company, or the moneyed por- 
tion of its directors. I shall not go into details concerning 
the struggle which ensued or the scandal which grew out 
of it. The Sharp side fi.nally won, and secured the fran- 
chise, all the members of the Board of Aldermen, save two, 
voting in favor of giving the grant to the original projector 



FATEFUL STRUGGLE FOU A BROADWAY RAILROAD. lOl 

of the scheme. And then old Jacob Sharp was happy. 
His perseverance had at last yielded fruit, the bread that he 
had cast upon the waters had come back to him — in 
theory, bftt not otherwise. 

For, angered by reason of the loss of the rich prize it 
had been fighting for, the defeated syndicate from Phila- 
delphia determined to "get even " with those who had re- 
fused its advances and had favored the scheme of their old 
fellow citizen, " Jake " Sharp. Accordingly, both through 
the press and through the machinery of the Courts, a move- 
ment was begun to prosecute the promoter of the scheme, 
as well as all who favored him, on the ground of " bribery 
and corruption." And all were indicted. Whereupon two 
or three of the Aldermen, under extreme pressure, turned 
State's evidence ; one member of the Board confessed to 
the acceptance of money ; two or three of the members 
were sent to State Prison ; others fled to Canada ; and all 
the rest of what was called " the combine " were disgraced 
and driven from power, while Jacob Sharp, a decrepit old 
man, in his sixty-seventh year, who had spent over thirty 
years in most earnest effort to obtain for the people of New 
York an accommodation in the way of travel, which they 
would 7iot to-day dispense with for millions of dollars, was 
arrested, tried, convicted on the charge of having bribed 
the Aldermen to vote in favor of his pet project, and on 
July 14th, 1887, was sentenced by Judge Barrett to confine- 
ment for four years and a half in the State Prison, and to 
pay a fine of $5,000. His counsel carried the case to the 
Court of Appeals which, through the eloquent and masterly 
argument of Hon.W.BourkeCockran, on November 29th, set 
aside the conviction of the lower Court, and Mr. Sharp was 
released on $4:0,000 bail. But he never recovered from the 
effect of his conviction and imprisonment ; and, like Alder- 
man Sturtevant, sinking under the nervous prostration 



108 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

which followed, he died on April 5th, 1888 — another martyr 
to the Broadway Railroad. 

Much sympathy has always been felt for this persevering 
champion of a beneficent project, who was drix^n to any 
violation of law he may have been guilty of, by the action 
of his persecutors, who, in seeking to bribe the Aldermen 
to favor tlieir demands, made necessary for self-protection 
the course to which old Mr. Sharp was driven ; and, if he 
were guilty of an infringement of the law, they were 
equally guilty. But the cry of " mad dog" had been raised 
against the poor old man Sharp, and he was sacrificed to 
appease public clamor. 

Much injustice has often been inflicted under this pres- 
sure of " public clamor." The case of Governor Sheppard 
(otherwise known as Boss Sheppard) of Washington 
City, D. C, furnishes an example. During the year 1868, 
Congress passed an Act which placed the District of Colum- 
bia under the charge of a Governor and a Board of Public 
"Works; the Board consisting of five members to be ap- 
pointed by the President. General Grant, the then Execu- 
tive, appointed Sheppard the Governor of the District, and 
under his direction Washington was transformed from a 
mud village to perhaps the most beautiful city in the world. 
But taxes and assessments necessarily followed ; and not- 
withstanding the value of property w^as more than doubled, 
popular clamor, created principally by disappointed con- 
tractors, forced Congress to repeal the law, and Sheppard, 
who, during his public service, had neglected his private 
business, found himself virtually a bankrupt, and his only 
reward was abuse piled mountains high. 

-In disgust at this ingratitude for all his efforts in behalf 
of the people, he determined to leave the city of his birth, 
accepted an offer to work on shares an unproductive silver 
mine in old Mexico, owned by a syndicate in New York, 
which had never paid one cent of dividend. Under his 



BARNUM'S BRIBERY WHALE STORY. 103 

excellent l)usiiiess methods he made the mine a very profit- 
able affair both for the owners and himself. About fifteen 
years afterwards, in comfortable circumstances financially, 
lie visited the City of Washington. By this time the people 
who had profited by his good work, their property being 
quadrupled in value, began to feel ashamed of their pre- 
vious treatment of him, and, to mark their appreciation, 
extended to him an ovation. He was received as a hero by 
some of the very parties who had most violentl}' traduced 
him. The flattery did not, however, turn his head ; he 
reminded them of the cause of his departure, and congratu- 
lated them on their " second sight." He subsequently re- 
turned to his mine in Mexico, where he and his family now 
live on the fat of the land. He is said to be a splendid 
fellow physically and mentally, and the peer of any of our 
so-called great men. Had poor Jacob Sharp lived through 
his persecution, as he doubtless would have done had he 
been a younger man, he might to day be similarly honored 
in New York as a public benefactor. 

As a relief to the sad and serious side of this letter, let 
me, in conclusion, add an anecdote or two which may be 
somewhat entertaining. 

The office of Alderman of New York is older than the 
incorporation of the city ; but it is only within the last 
thirty or forty years that anybody ever heard of '' bribing " 
the Aldermen ; and even within the period referred to there 
has been a good deal more fiction than fact in such charges. 
It is a very easy thing for people to say that the Board of 
Aldermen has been' " fixed " or '' seen ; " in nine cases out 
of ten it is, no donbt, common slander. Yet, almost always 
where there is much smoke, there is bound to be some fire. 

The first man who ever publicly stated that he bribed 
the Aldermen of New York was not himself a politician 
or a contractor, but a show-man, the renowned Phineas T. 
Barnum, " author of t he woolly horse," as he sometimes 



104 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

called himself; and, somewhat funny to state, tlic object of 
the first confessed bribe was not a franchise, or a contract. 
or an office, but a fish ! Still, the story is not at all " fishy,"' 
but true in every point, according to Barnum, who gave 
the particulars as follows. 

Among the early attractions of his museum, which stood 
on the site of the present twenty-sixstoried St. Paul Build- 
ing (with one exception the highest of the high buildings 
of the metropolis) on the corner of Broadway and Ann 
street, Barnum had secured a couple of whales. There was 
no humbug about these whales ; they were Simon-pure, al- 
though small, and proved a drawing card. Comparatively 
small as the whales were, they were really big fish, needing 
a lot of w^ater, which it was found more and more difficult 
to supply. 

Immense quantities of salt were put into the fresh-water 
tank which held the whales, but somehow they did not 
thrive on this artificial sea-water. The cetaceans were no 
fools ; they detected the cheat at once, ]iined for the original 
article, and it soon became evident that either they must be 
taken back to the sea or they must die unless somehow or 
other the sea be brought to them in their present location. 
The last of the horns of the dilemma was the one which 
Barnum determined to take. With the aid of a master 
plumber, he worked out the idea of having a pipe connec- 
tion between his museum and tlie Hudson River, at the foot 
of Vesey street. 

Simple enough in itself and feasible, the work would 
cost about three thousand dollars— more money than the 
whales had originally cost. But Barnum wis not the sort 
of man to higgle over the cost of a good thing ; so that 
was settled. But suddenly he was notified officially that 
he could not lay Ins pipes without a permit from the Board 
of Aldermen. He placed his petition for the pipe before 
the Board, and to his surprise it was rejected. It took 



BOODLE BUSINESS IN A STREET CONTRACT. 105 

about a week to get the Board of Aldermen to reconsider 
its vote on this pipe matter and finally pass on it formally. 
The only argument meantime presented by the irrepressible 
Barnum was one thousand dollars, which, he alleged, was 
divided, in sums of fifty and one hundred dollars, among 
the members of the Board, The Aldermen put their little 
fifty or one hundred dollars apiece in their pockets ; and 
then, on free passes, went to the museum to see the whales 
disport in the salt water, which had already " salted " the 
Aldermen. 

Such is the story of the first confessed bribe administered 
to the Aldermanic Board — almost a burlesque on a bribe. 

Another confessed bribe was a much larger and more 
serious affair. The party who did the bribery was Hackley, 
a street-cleaning contractor, and his " whale " cost him 
forty times what Barnum's did. According to Hackley's 
sworn statement, he put in a bid for the street-cleaning 
contract ; but the Aldermen higgle-haggled over it^ keep- 
ing him on the anxious seat for a long time. 

While things were in this unsatisfactory state, Hackley 
received a letter, peculiar in wording and suggestive of 
bargain and "■ boodle," only it was unsigned. This letter 
was written on a sheet of the official paper of the Board of 
Aldermen, in an evidently disguised hand. It was short 
(and, from a certain point of view, sweet) and in substance 
amounted to about this : " If you will leave forty thousand 
dollars in a package on a table " (in a certain designated 
room) " in the City Hall " (at a certain time) " your bid 
will be passed upon favorably the very next day by the 
Board of Aldermen. If you do not leave the package 
with the money, your contract vv'ill be forthwith rejected 
by that Board." 

This was decisive as it was l)rief. Hackley did not hesi- 
tate. In his opinion the contract was worth five times 
more than forty thousand dollars. So he went to his 



106 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

partner, a man named Hope, and got the money in five 
hundred dollar bills. These bills he wrapped up in a pack- 
age without any address, and carrying it in his hand, like 
an ordinary bundle, entered the designated room in the 
(yity Ilall at the appointed time. 

Outside the door stood, as if they had accidentally met 
and were casually conversing, four members of the Board 
of Aldermen. They did not look at Hackley, though 
Hackley looked at, but did not speak to, them. lie then 
entered the designated room, which was empty, put the 
package on the table, left it there, and went out of the 
room. When he came out the Aldermen were still stand- 
ing around the door. They did not speak to Hackley, nor 
did Hackley speak to them. All was secrecy, mystery, 
silence. But the next day Hackley' s contract was unani- 
mously confirmed. , 

For some years the courts were occupied in deciding 
questions of legality regarding this Hackley contract, and 
the matter was finally decided in his favor. But his " busi- 
ness" deahng with the Aldermen came to light during the 
course of the litigation which followed the awarding of the 
contract. 



LETTER X. 

Attempt to Enforce Obsolete Blue Laws in the Metropolis 
— The Boomerang Effects of an Arbitrary Excise En- 
actment — Indignant Response of the Metropolis to 
Sectional Legislation — Partisan Method op Interpret- 
ing A Sumptuary Law— Why Liquor Saloons Became 
Political Centres— When a Presidential Election was 
Lost Through the Sabbatarian Efforts of a New Jersey 
Parson, who was Henry Clay's "Burchard" — How a 
Sunday "Blue Law" Saved the Staten Island Ferry 
Company from Consequential Damages. 

My dear Dean : 

In tlie liistory of our local politics, no question lias been 
more discussed, or more ti'oublesome, than the Excise Law. 
It has, indeed, proven a veritable Pandora's box to the 
Republican party, which, in 1866, with the aim of conquer- 
ing, by " reconstruction," this Democratic stronghold (in 
the same way that its leaders sought to Republicanize the 
Southern States through military governors appointed at 
Washington) passed, as the forerunner of similar Boards of 
Commissioners to be appointed at Albany, the Act known 
as " The Metropolitan Excise Law." 

The experience of mankind confirms what common sense 
would at once suggest, that the manners and morals of a 
people can never be molded by legislation. If a law har- 
monizes with the opinions and prejudices of the people on 
whom it is to be enforced, it will be honored and obeyed. 
If, on the contrary, it is repugnant to their sense of right, 
or in restraint of their tastes and habits, it will be a dead- 
letter, or an object of derision and contempt. The Fugitive 
Slave Law was enacted for the benefit of the South and the 
institutions of slavery which it maintained, yet it did more 
than all other causes combined to destroy the very establish- 

m 



108 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ment it was intended to conserve. It goaded the conscience 
of the North ; it made the people on this side of " Mason 
and Dixon's line" feel j}articej}s cnminis in all the errors 
and crimes of servitude, every time a runaway negro was 
returned to his master. And the experience which the 
people of this State had had in the matter of prohibitory 
legislation ought to have satisfied anybody, except a fanatic, 
that enforced teetotalism or any partisan sumptuary htw was 
something to which the people of this metropolitan city 
would not submit. 

It is true that in tins State we once had a temperance 
Governor. Myron H. Clark had been nominated by the 
Whigs for that position, and the story was circulated that 
the strongest liquid he imbibed was lemonade without " a 
stick in it'\ Some of the more enthusiastic temperance 
folks thereupon called a convention of the friends of cold 
water, and at this gathering they resolved to, and did, en- 
dorse Clark as their candidate for Governor, because it had 
been ascertained that Horatio Seymour, the Democratic 
candidate, occasionally indulged in a glass of ale or a 
" whiskey sour." The combination elected Clark, and his 
election gave much comfort and courage to the cold-water 
brigade. 

As a quid pro quo for the indorsement he had received 
from the temperance people. Governor Clark recommended 
the passage of and advocated a law modeled somewhat after 
the pattern of what was known as the " Maine Liquor Law." 
At the instance of a zealot named Xeal Dow. the Legisla- 
ture of the State of Maine, in 1851, passed an Act entitled 
" A Bill for the Suppression of Drinking-Houses and Tip- 
pHng-shops," wljicli provided for the search of places where 
it was suspected that liquors intended for sale M-ere kept, 
and for the seizure, condemnation, and confiscation of 
liquors, if found, and for the punishment of persons keep- 
ing them, by fine and imprisonment. The law recommended 



EXCrSP] LAWS AND .SABBATARIAN ENACTMENTS. 109 

by Governor Clark was a modified duplicate of the Maine 
enactment, applicable to tlie entire State ; but to all intents 
and purposes it proved a dead letter. 

Thereafter the temperance or teetotal question was *but 
little stirred until the period referred to, 1866, when, to 
please the Sunday-law agitators, '' The Metropolitan Excise 
Act" was passed. It made all the prohibitory features of 
the Maine Law applicable to New York on Sunday, but 
permitted the sale of liquors every other day of the week, 
under stated conditions, by those who were willing to pay a 
license of $250 for dispensing "hard stuff"; and, in order 
to try and win the German vote to the Republican side, the 
license for the sale of lager bier was made only one hundred 
dollars. This restrictive law was applicable to the Met- 
ropolitan Excise District, composed of the counties of New 
York and Kings (the City of Brooklyn), and to no other 
part of the State. The duty of licensing persons to sell 
liquor was j^laced in the hands of the Commissioners of the 
Board of Health, and they were permitted to license oidy 
persons of "good moral character," which, as interpreted, 
meant that any keeper of a hotel, tavern, or house of enter- 
tainment, where liquors were sold, who did not or would 
not vote the Radical ticket, might as well put up the shut- 
ters at once. The law was intended to give the " faithful " 
a monopoly of the profits arising from the dissemination of 
alcohol, while the rules adopted for the enforcement of the 
law permitted espionage, blackmail and tyranny to be prac- 
ticed on all persons engaged in the business who still ad- 
hered to the Democratic faith. The outrages practised 
under this new law, both in New York and Brooklyn, but 
chiefly in this city, would fill a series of volumes as bulky as 
those comprising the Encyclopedia Britannica ; and it would 
be idle for me to attempt to enter into the details. But a 
single exemplification of the manner in which the "machine" 
was " worked " may not be out of place. In the proceed- 



ilO THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ings of the Excise Board, May 17, 1866, appeared the fol- 
lowing, copied from the official report made by the police 
of their examination into the affairs of two venders of 
liqi^Dr, who were applicants for licenses under the new law: 

"Moses O'Neil, coroner of Doughty and Columbia streets, Brooklyn. 
Bad record." 

O'Neil produced a paper to show his good character. 

Mr. Kennedy, Superintendent of Police — " Oh, it does not matter 
what other people say. This list, furnished by the police, is what we 
go by. Your neighbors do not know you as well as the police ; your 
father does not know you as well ; and of course your wife does not 
know you either." 

Mr. O'iSTeil retired in disgust, and without a licence. 

"Peter Tucker, 97 High street, Brooklyn. Had bad record at one 
time. Peter is a colored man ; has both blacks and whites at his 
house." 

Commenting editorially on this, a leading Democratic 
paper of the period said : 

Mr. O'Neil was endorsed ar- a man of unimpeachable moral charac- 
ter; but he is a poor man and votes the Democratic ticket, and those 
are offences not to be condoned. Peter Tucker, the colored man 
above referred to, who had kept a place which was an intolerable 
nuisance, a rendezvous for blacks and whites, for all ages, sexes and 
conditions, was licensed without any difficulty, and his den is privi- 
leged to remain in full blast. But, then, he is sound on the Radical 
"goose," and votes the right ticket; and that is sufficient to cover all 
the sins in the Decalogwe. These two cases exhibit a practical view of 
the working of the new law. 

Men of German lineage in the metropolis had been in 
the habit of spending Smnday in company with their wives 
Rnd friends in the capacious gardens of the city, where 
fresh air, green trees, fragrant flowers, with the charms of 
music told them that the Sovereign Ruler of the Universe 
designed that all Ilis human creatures should partake of 
His bounty, and that snch as were yoked to toil and miasms 
for six days of the week should liave respite and relaxation 
on the seventh. But, under the new law, this idea was to 
be eliminated from the Divine economy; Sunday, the poor 



APPEAL OF THE METROPOLIS FOR RELIEF. Ill 

man's day of rest and recreation, was to be made a day of 
gloom and privation. Hence, instead of making friends of 
the German element for tlie Republican party, the effect of 
the new Excise law was to turn them almost to a man 
against it — that is to say, secretly so ; and every saloon- 
keeper in the city, for his own protection and preservation, 
while compelled for the time to abide by the provisions of 
the obnoxious law, secretly determined to work with all 
his might to secure its repeal. 

At the opening of the Legislative session of 1868, the 
hearts of the sorely oppressed saloon-keepers grew buoyant 
with the hope that at least some modification of the existing 
oppressive law would be obtained ; for the Democracy were 
in the ascendant in the Assembly, the Republicans had a 
majority of only two in the Senate, and Senator Tweed had 
promised them that he would use all his influence in that 
body to secure a repeal of the law, or, at least obtain some 
modification of it. But, while a repealing bill passed 
through the Democratic Assembly, and received the sup- 
port of all Democrats in the Senate, the Republican leaders 
determined, owing to the pressure made upon them by the 
Sabbatarians throughout the State, (who demanded a Puri- 
tan Sunday for New York,) to make the retention of that 
enactment on the statute book a party measure, and the 
session ended with none of the relief expected. Never be- 
fore was so large a majority (upwards of sixty thousand) 
rolled up far the Democratic ticket in New York City as 
was recorded at the ensuing Fall election. This response 
of the metropolis brought the Repul)licans to their senses, 
and the obnoxious Act was afterwards modified, so far at 
least as to grant the saloon-keepers some relief from the 
espionage and blackmailing to which they had been sub- 
jected. But, from that p^n-iod to the present time, the 
saloon-keeper has, of necessity, been a considerable factor 
in mnnicipal politics. 



113 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS, 

Incidentally I may remark that it was part of the original 
charter of New York, according to old time records, that 
the officials of the city government should be paid from 
an Excise tax. It can therefore be seen that, from the be- 
ginning, it was the policy of the city authorities to encour- 
age, not to oppress, taverns and public houses. In New 
Amsterdam the taverns were under the special control and 
protection of the city government, which regulated all their 
details and protected their proprietors in all their rights. 
The law even regulated the precise amount of liquor which 
was given or could be demanded for a drink. Any man 
who "beat" the barkeeper, or did not pay his bill, was 
ostracized as well as punished. Originally the New York 
taverns were, in fact, used as District Courts. The magis- 
trates decided local disputes at the local taverns. And as 
the Court held its sessions and rendered its decisions at the 
taverns, so the tines imposed by the courts were often taken 
out in drinks. The Judges, witnesses and all concerned, 
including the plaintiff and defendant, would order their 
drinks, and take them together, and then the party against 
whom decisions were reudered would pay for them — a 
pleasant way of paying a fine, especially for the landlord ! 
When the Dutch surrendered New Amsterdam to the Eng- 
lish, the courts became more dull and dignified. Regular 
halls of justice were established, and the tap-room ceased to 
be a court-room ; nevertheless, under the English as under 
the Dutch, the New York tavern continued to be a political 
centre, and it has so remained down to our own day. 

I referred above to the influence brought to bear upon 
the Republican leaders by the Sabbatarian extremists. The 
attempts of bigots years ago to revive the odious and obso- 
lete Sunday " blue laws," under the name of religion, did 
more to disgust the public with Sunday and religious mat- 
ters generally than all the infidels in the country put to- 
gether. The Metropolitan Police force was always made 



iEVERYTHtNGt SACRfiD ON SUNDAY BUT PHYSlC. Il3 

tlie tool of the Sunday bigots, and, under the pressure of a 
self-organized Sabbatarian Committee, once brought to bear 
upon the Commissioners, an order was issued from head- 
quarters for the arrest of all venders of Sunday newspapers. 
Under this determination to have a " Christian Sabbath," 
two newsboys, instigated directly by Satan to support them- 
selves by selling Sunday papers, were arrested by three God- 
fearing policemen and taken to a station-house ; but they 
were promptly discharged by a fearless and upright Jus- 
tice. 

The then Superintendent of Police, John A. Kennedy? 
having resigned his position in April, 1870, after twelve years 
of service, the Sabbatarians looked round to find, if possible, 
someone who would more recklessly carry out their extreme 
notions ; and they discovered one Amos Pillsbury, who had 
for many years been Warden of the Connecticut State 
Prison, as his father before him had been, and who was noted 
for the severity of his will. Bringing influence to bear, 
they succeeded in having him appointed Superintendent of 
Police in this city ; and he promised to be " a pink of per- 
fection " from their stand-point. Under the inspiration of 
the Sabbath Committee, he made a fresh start on the Sun- 
day question, and determined to give the metropolis a first- 
class " Christian Sabbath " — a Sunday so sacred that nothing 
but physic should be sold, and only on a doctor's 
certificate. Only pills were sacred under Pillsbury. You 
could have your Sunday jalap, but not your Sunday julep ; 
under Pillsbury you could swallow a whole quart of laud- 
anum, sooner than a drop of liquor; strychnine was access- 
ible, but cigars were not ; if a starving beggar had a quarter 
given to him by some kind-hearted person on the Lord's 
Day, he would have to stay hungry and thirsty until Mon- 
day morning, for he could not sooner spend the quarter for 
food and drink without being liable to arrest. And all this 
did not take place in a lunatic asylum, among incurables, 



il4 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

but was supposed to be carried out as the law in the largest 
city in the United States, and which ought to be the freest 
city in the world. 

Such arbitrary and uncalled for proceedings, with others 
of like character, so outraged the leading business men of 
the community that they issued a call for a mass meeting 
of citizens to protest against such exhibitions of what they 
called " pea-nut piety.'' The hall of Cooper Union was 
crowded to overflowing ; and this demonstration settled the 
Sunday " blue law '' question and Mr. Pillsbury. One 
month of Pillsbury Sundays and one Cooper Union Mass 
Meeting had the effect of corking-up Sunday law bigotry 
for that time. 

Here I may remark, and it is a well authenticated fact, 
that an attempt to stop the carrying of mails on Sunday, to 
oblige the Sabbatarian element, lost Henry Clay, or, rather, 
the Whig party, a Presidential election. The mails from 
Philadelphia to New York passed through New Brunswick, 
New Jersey, by coach, every Sunday, and the mail-coach 
rattled through the streets of that genial town about church 
time. One of the ministers of New Brunswick, the pastor 
of the church attended by the Frelinghuysen family and 
other " big bugs,'' protested against " this unseemly inter- 
ruption " and stirred up Mr. Frelinghuysen himself about 
it. 

Mr. Frelinghuysen, besides being a United States Sen- 
ator from New Jersey, Avas a religious man, a member of 
the church, a teacher of the Sundy school and a warden of 
the church. He was obliged to feel, or pretend to feel, 
about this matter as his pastor felt ; so he, too, got indig- 
nant about this mail-coach nuisance. But parson's protest 
and church wardens' indignation did not stop the United 
States mail ; and so the coach thundered along every Sun- 
day at about " meeting-time." Finally, the parson, almost 
frantic over this Sunday mail " outrage," persuaded his 



SfiCRKT OF ONE OF HENRY CLAY'S DEFEATS. II.' 

warden to use his political intluence in the matter. When 
a ]>arson meddles, or gets others to meddle, with politics, 
he generally gets his friends into some sort of trouble, and 
the Frelinghuysen affair was a most memorable and striking 
example of this truth. 

Frelinghuysen was a prominent AVhig, and a valued 
friend of the great Whig leader, Henry Claj, the dream 
of whose life (having aimed for it in 1824, '32, '40, '4-4 and 
'48) was to be President. Though somewhat of a bigot, Fre- 
linghuysen was no hypocrite. He was widely respected 
and esteemed, and, on the whole, a very worthy and honor- 
able man. But he made one great mistake. To gratify 
his parson, he introduced a bill into Congress to stop the 
carrying of mails tm Sunday — a bill which would injure 
the business interests of a vast country in order to obviate a 
two minutes' inconvenience to one querulous minister. 
The Congress of the United States '* sat down" on this 
bill, as might have been expected ; and when the Whig- 
party unwisely nominated Mr. Frelinghuysen for Yice- 
President in the Fall of 1844, at the same time that Henry 
Clay for the second time was put in nomination for the 
Presidency, the people of the United States made it a 
point to " sit down " very heavily on Mr. Frelinghuysen 
for his anti-Sunday Mails bill. The opposition stirred up 
against him by the business men of the country, on account 
of his anti-Sunday mail proclivities, defeated not only him, 
but also Mr. Clay. 

The contest between Polk and Dallas (Democrats) and 
Clay and Frelinghuysen (Whigs) in the year 1844 was a 
very close one. 

There was no electric telegraph at that period, and it took 
several days, sometimes eight or ten, before decisive results 
could be had. For some reason or other, the canvass of 
votes in the States of New York and Pennsylvania was 
very much behind the usual time ; but as they were gener- 



Il6 THIRTi" YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ally classed among AVliig States, it was conceded that, if 
normal conditions had prevailed in those localities, Clay and 
Frelinghuysen had carried them. Some of the more ex- 
nberant of Whigs, who conld not abide the slow issue of 
the election canvass, hired a band of music, and in the 
evening proceeded to an up-town hotel at which Mr. 
Frelinghuysen was temporarily stopping, and gave him a 
serenade of congratulation upon his election as Vice-Presi- 
dent of the United States. Mr. Frelinghuysen appeared on 
the balcony of the hotel, and, being assured by his over- 
eulhusiastic friends that " there was no doubt of his elec- 
tion," he indulged in a short speech of thankfulness for the 
honor that had been conferred upon him, and, after more 
music by the band, retired for the night, firmly believing 
that he had been, as his friends assured him, elected. But, 
alas! in a day or two the mails brought in the returns from 
the back counties of New York and Pennsylvania, which 
went to show that those States had both been carried by the 
Democrats, and Mr. Clay had again been defeated — this 
time only by a majority of forty thousand in the entire 
Union. All his friends believed, and it was no doubt true, 
fehat but for the opposition which had been stirred up by 
the business men of the country against his " running mate," 
on account of the attempt to interfere with the running of 
Sunday mails, the "Mill Boy of the Slashes," as Henry Clay 
was designated, would have fully realized his fond an- 
ticipation — that of being President of the United States. 

Up to the year 1871, the statute-book of this State M^as 
still disgraced with various old enactments, intended to en- 
force, by threats of punishment, a puritanical observance of 
Sunday. One of those effete laws prohibited travel on that 
day exc3pt going to church ; and it wiis this ridiculous 
provision which the Staten Island Ferry Company success- 
fully invoked as a defense against all claims of damages 
suffered in consequence of the terrible explosion on one of 



BLUE LAWS AS A DEFENCE FOR DAMAGES. 117 

the company's boats, the Westfield, in July, 1870. As 
those who were on board the ferryboat were traveling on a 
Sunday, and not going to church, they were themselves 
transgressors of the law, and had therefore no legal status 
in Court, and could not recover. The effect of this dreadful 
accident was to secure an amendment of the laws of this 
State, so as to make Sunday traveling legal and to give any 
person injured on that day the same right of redress as if 
he had been hurt on a Monday. 

But bigotry is not entirely extinct. It was only a short 
time ago that the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Rail- 
road, of New Jersey, began to run Sunday passenger trains. 
The previous refusal to do so was a survival from a former 
generation, when there were more men than there are now 
who thought it wrong to supply facilities for travel on Sun- 
day. Scarcely had the railroad company awakened from 
its lethargy and granted this long-wanted public accommo- 
dation, than some of the clergy of Hoboken and other 
localities remonstrated against the action of the directors, 
and called upon church members to punish the company by 
patronizing during the week, if possible, any means of 
transportation other than that of the oifending corporation. 
The directorate of the railroad had the good sense, 
however, not to weaken in its progressive ideas, and real 
estate in the vicinity of the line of railway being much 
benefitted, in consequence of the increased transportation 
facilities, the distressed parsons were compelled to " switch 
off'' their unseemly vituperations and accept the situation. 

On the threshold of the twentieth century, the American 
people will not tolerate offensive bigotry of any kind in any 
direction. This profound truth was so fully exemplified in 
this city a quarter of a century ago that no attempt has 
since been made in the metropolis to revive the ancient 
and musty Sunday " blue laws." I do not forget or ignore 
the hysterical attempts made to enforce an unpopular Excise 



118 TmiiTY YEAKS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Law in recent years under the Police Board composed of 
Commissioners Roosevelt, Parker, Andrews and Grant. 
P>ut the statute they sought to enforce, although assailed as 
" a blue law," was not so obnoxious as those to which I 
have previously referred. 



LETTER XL 

Boss Tweed's Appearance as Senator at the State Capital 
— His Ambition Goes Marching On — Feeble Attempt to 
Check His Progress — He Elects the Speaker, "Fixes" 
the Committees, and Settles down to Business— An 
Unexpected " Fire in the Eear" — Mayor Hoffman Con- 
fronted WITH A Realizing Sense of his Position — The 
Old Tax Levies and the Art and Science of Legislative 
Legerdemain — Horacje Greeley's Scathing Denuncia- 
tion of Tweed and the Tammany Leeches. 

My dear Dean : 

As stated in a preceding letter, v/lien Boss Tweed set 
foot in Albany at the opening of the month of January, 
1868, he was almost "monarch of all he surveyed." But he 
knew that there were "other worlds to conquer.''' He had 
brought with him from the metropolis four lieutenants, 
Senators like himself, experienced in the arts and mysteries 
of New York politics, and all capable assistants whom he 
could rely upon in legislative emergencies ; in addition to 
these he could number among his retinue twenty Demo- 
cratic Assemblymen (most of them on the City pay-roll) 
who would respond to his word of command whenever 
their services w^ere needed. But, in order the better to 
"hold the fort," he determined (the Democrats then being 
in the ascendancy in the Assembly) to capture for one of 
his henchmen a very important outpost, the office of S})eaker, 
in whom was and still is lodged the appointment of all the 
Committees in the body over which he presides, and who 
was and still is clothed with what may be regarded as 
despotic power in certain stages of legislation, having the 
ability, by his recognition of motions for "unanimous con- 
sent to suspend the rules," to advance the measure of any of 

ii9 



120 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

his friends on the floor of the House to what is known as a 
"third reading,'' without ha\nng to go through tlie long 
and tedious formalities of legislation. The remnant of 
what was known as "The Albany Regency," which had 
controlled the Democratic politics of this State for more 
than half a century, and to which Samuel J. Tilden, the 
head and front of the Democratic State Central Committee, 
had long been attached, and who was the remnant referred 
to, had become a little jealous of Tweed's rising power in the 
State. "When Tweed put Assemblyman (popularly known 
as " Billy ") Hitchman, from New York City, in the field 
as a candidate for the position of Speaker, he was confronted 
by opposition from the source of which I speak, in the 
person of John L. Flagg, the then popular Mayor of the city 
of Troy, and a representative in the Assembly from the 
county of Rensselaer. But, with the conscious power of a 
"well-fixed" gladiator, Tweed entered the arena of the 
Democratic caucus behind his chosen favorite, Assembly- 
man Hitchman, and, in the language of the reporter for a 
Republican newspaper, who described the somewhat excit- 
ing scene, " slipped around like a porpoise among the small 
fishes of the Assembly, varying the performance, now 
and then, by reverently raising his hands and blessing his 
dearly beloved Democratic children." I scarcely need add 
that Hon. "Wm. Hitchman was the Democratic caucus 
nominee for Speaker, and soon thereafter became the ruling 
power in the House of Assembly. 

This new triumph was an additional feather in Boss 
Tweed's cap, and as he reclined, after the consummation of 
his purpose, in his capacious suite of seven richly-furnished 
rooms on the second tioor of the Delavan House, Albany, with 
attendants (of course on the municipal pay-roll) to guard 
the outer doors, he could look with almost unalloyed satis- 
faction at his surroundings, and, if not exactly "every inch 
a king " he felt that he was very near the topmost round of 



TWEED'S ALMOST SUPREME POWElt. l3i 

tiie ladder of liis ambition. In tlie metropolis he Lad iiiider 
his control at least three, if not four, of the five Judges of the 
Supreme Court (for I omitted to state, in a former letter, 
that at the same canvass, 186T, in which he was elected 
State Senator, he had also had elected as a Judge of the 
Supreme Court Albert Cardozo;) he also controlled the 
Judges of minor courts ; the Mayor of the city, John T. 
Hoffman ; the Comptroller, Richard B. Connolly, who 
had then but just entered upon his duties, (elected only in 
the preceding November,) but whom Tweed knew as an 
" apt scholar " ; the Counsel to the Corporation, Richard 
O'Gorman. a very valuable and capable law adviser ; the 
District Attorney, A. Oakey Hall, one of the brightest 
members of the New York Bar, at that period ; the 
Recorder, John K. Hackett, also an able jurist and tlie tal- 
ented son of a once popular comedian ; the Street Commis- 
sioner, the amiable George W. McLean, Tweed's then 
" superior officer," but who was simply a figure-head 
in the position ; and also the presiding officers of the Boards 
of Aldermen and Councilmen. And now, in addition to 
all these, he was, through his friend the Speaker, actual 
Boss of the Assembly of the State, and he was also 
strongly entrenched in the Senate. All that then remained 
to fill up the bill of his aspirations, was to get possession of 
the citadel at Albany, for which he had once aimed and 
which was then occupied l)y Governor Fenton, a Republi- 
can. This he had now determined to secure at the very 
first opportunity, and at all hazards. 

But "uneasy lies the head that wears a crown," and 
annoyances are the common lot of humanity. The seats 
around the circle of the Senate chaml)er in the then old 
brown-stone Capitol (for the present extensive and expensive 
twenty-million dollar Capitol, a job inspired by the resi- 
dents of Albany to head oft" a growing desire to designate 
New York City as the Capital of the State, was not at that 



i2'2 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

time coniiiienced) were not of sufficient capacity to 
acconnnodate the magnificent proportions of the Boss, 
as he discovered the first day he attempted to take his 
assigned chair ; and he had to hold a sort of levee in the 
cloak room during that session of the Senate, while the 
Clerk of tiiat body immediately ordered and had ready for 
the next day's session a special seat, larger, stronger, and in 
every way adapted to the emeigency. 

Tweed's next step was to get himself comfortably fixed 
on the Senate Committees, and this he managed to do 
through the agency of his Republican associate in the New 
York Board of Supervisors, " Hank " Smith, a prominent 
leader in Republican politics. In this way Tweed secured 
a position on the Finance Committee, through which all 
appropriations of whatever kind had to pass; and on the 
Committee of Internal Affairs, which would have control 
of most of the subordinate legislation of the State, to which 
would be referred the "local bills" introduced by Senators 
from the interior, and which would also have charge of 
Excise measures, in which the city of New York was then 
especially interested ; and he also managed to have his four 
Senatorial friends from jSTew York located on " outposts " or 
Committees which best suited his purposes and would give 
him through them greater " influence." Then the Boss, 
having also arranged, through the Speaker, all the import- 
ant Committees of the Assembly to control, the members of 
that body, settled down and was ready for business. 

Distinguished for being composed of many men of great 
ability was that body of which Tweed was a member in 
1868-69. The Presiding officer was Lieutenant-Governor 
Woodford, a Republican in politics, and a gentleman who 
has since filled many important postions, more recently that 
of Minister to Spain, prior to recent hostilities between that 
country and the United States ; while the leader of the 
Republican party in the State, Judge Clias. J. Folger, who 



POPULARITY OF TIIK ROSS AS A LRGISLATOR. I'i3 

subscqueiitly filled the position of United States Secretary 
of the Treasury, and Justice of our Court of Appeals, was 
also one of Tweed's brother Senators, on the Republican 
side of the House. Then there was Judge Geoyge N. 
Kennedy, from Syracuse, and Judge Matthew Hale, from 
Albany, also Republicans. Among the Democratic mem- 
bers were Henry C. Murphy, formerly United States Min- 
ister to the Netherlands, and James F. Pierce, subsequently 
for many years State Superintendent of Isurance. Always 
kindly diposed, helping his brother Senators as best he 
could to advance their matters of local legislation in which 
no party politics were concerned, Tweed became very pop- 
ular in the State Senate, and being broad-minded, hospitable 
and generous, he was much respected and esteemed, and by 
no one more than by the brainiest and the then most 
statesmanlike leader of the Republican party, to whom I 
have referred. Judge Charles J. Folger. 

I do not purpose to speak in detail of • Tweed's career in 
the Senate of which he M'^as then a member. From what I 
have stated you will be able to conceive that from his vast 
political influence and surroundings, and with all the capa- 
bilities at his command in the City of New York to obtain 
a supply of " the sinews of M^ar," he was almost a dictator. 
But, then, there are one or two incidents of a somewhat 
remarkable character that occured during his Senatorial 
life, which will no doubt interest you, and to which I shall 
presently recur. Before so doing I desire to give you some 
explanation of the " Tax Levy" features of our State legis- 
lation, to show you why Tweed had a special interest in 
those measures, and to narrate an incident which will illus- 
trate some of the *' statesmanlike " capabilities of the 
Boss. 

A trite adage says that " when the cat's away the mice 
will play." In verification of the proverb, while Tweed 
was busy, and much engrossed with affairs of State at 



IM 'iHIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLltlCS. 

Albany, a rumpus occurred in the house of his friends in 
New York. The Common Council, composed of the Board 
of Aldermen and Board of Councilmen, had excited a great 
deal of qriticism in the public press concerning the passage 
of ordinances which were denounced as "jobs," &c., but 
much of this denunciation was doubtless exaggeration, as 
the Mayor, John T. Hoffman, a man who believed he had 
a future, promptly affixed his approval to the measures. 
At the particular time to which I now refer, however, 
there had been passed by the Common Council an ordi- 
nance for the " opening, regulating and improving of the 
avenues or boulevards north of Central Park,'' a somewhat 
"gigantic" ordinance, which not only deluged the Mayor^ 
the day after its passage by the Common Council^ 
with an avalanche of remonstrances, but caused his office 
to be besieged by some of the most prominent taxpayers 
vehemently opposed to what they called "the monstrous 
steal." And the Mayor, forgetting, perhaps, for the 
moment, that his political creator. Boss Tweed, was then 
Deputy Street Commissioner (a bureau of the city govern- 
ment which had charge not only of the opening, altering 
regulating, grading and flagging of streets, but the construc- 
tion and repairing of public roads, the building, repairing 
and lighting of wharves and piers, the care of public 
buildings, and the lighting of streets, roads, places and 
avenues) or, perhaps, in the innocence of his heart, believ- 
ing that it was a part of his duties to act occasionally for 
the interest of the public at large, at once vetoed the 
offending city ordinance. Then there was a row which 
extended " up the river," as was the then customary phrase 
of politicians when referring to Albany. 

It was generally understood at the time that there was a 
lively scene in the Mayors private room in the City Hall, 
the next day, when the Boss had occasion to absent 
himself from the State Capital. Certain it is that, as a 



PUTTING OUT A "FIRE IN THE REAR." 125 

result of his visit to the metropolis, and after his return to 
the Senate chamber, there appeared in the Albany cor- 
respondence of the Kew York papers an announcement 
that " Tweed was arranging matters to be a candidate for 
Governor at the ensuing Fall election." It was the Xew 
York Sun, I think, which put it in this way: 

"The last political move is the trotting out of William M. Tweed for 
Governor. Mayor Hoffman lias no friend among the New York Dem- 
ocratic leaders except it may be Mr. Sweeny; but this gentleman is 
only a plotter. Tweed makes the combinations, and Tweed has com- 
menced to canvass for himself. He can secure the nomination." 

This announcement was a dreadful piece of " hand- 
writing on the wall " for Mayor (hoping-to-be-Governor) 
Hoffman, and it caused a commotion in his bosom. As 
a result, there was a conference at the City Hall, at 
which Tweed was not present, but certain members of the 
Common Council were, and in less than three days after 
the announcement above referred to, the " monstrous steal " 
embraced in the ordinance to which I have referred, was 
passed over the Mayor's veto. All matters pertaining to 
improvements of streets received thereafter the " most 
careful consideration," from his Honor, and he indulged in 
no more vetoes of the kind which had produced so much 
disturbance. Quietude having thus been restored among 
the members of the " happy family," when the Democratic 
State Convention for the nomination of State officers was 
held, in the ensuing month of October, Mr. Tweed carried 
out the purpose he had so long in view, nominated Mayor 
Hoffman for Governor, to which position he was elected, 
and thereafter there was no misunderstanding or difficulty 
between the Governor and the Boss — the current of their 
lives ran smoothly on. 

To i-etuni now to an explanation of the " Tax Levy " or, 
more properly speaking, the '' Tax Levies," for, at this 
period, there were really two sets of officeholders in charge 



126 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW ^ORK POLITICS. 

of the municipal government — the Common Council, com- 
posed, as I have befoi'e stated, of the Board of Aldermen 
and the Board of Councilmen, and the Board of Super- 
visors — the former having charge of all " City '' affairs and 
the latter taking charge of all " County " matters. The 
Comptroller, therefore, prepared two budgets, based upon 
answers made to his inquiries by the different departments 
of the municipal government. One of these, the "• County 
Budget," he would send to the Boai'd of Supervisors, and 
the other, the " City Budget,'- he would transmit to the 
Common Council. These two honorable bodies would sit, 
like hens, upon their respective budgets, hatch out of 
course more " eggs," and respectfully request the city's 
financial head to prepare the necessary " Levy " bills for 
submission to the Legislature. Whereupon the Comp- 
troller would have them prepared, and send the Bills to the 
Speaker of the Assembly, who after presentation Avould re- 
fer the proposed measures to the Committee on Affairs of 
Cities. This proceeding was generally gone through with 
in the month of January or the early part of February ; 
but it was rare indeed that the bills were ever reported from 
the Committee to which they had been referred until a day 
or two before the close of the session. In tlie meantime, 
the budgets kept swelling like the waters at flood-tide, and 
when the bills finally saw the light and were laid upon the 
Speakers desk as reports from the Committee, they con- 
tained all manner of additions, " jobs " innumerable and 
inexplicable, " which " as was well said, in the progress of 
discussion, " were not called for by any but plundering 
beneficiaries." Of course, on the heel of the annual session, 
the mass of rural members of the House were anxious to 
return to their homes, from which many of them had been 
absent for months, and as they had no interest in these 
local budgets, and were too impatient to satisfy themselves 
whether or no the hundred or more paragraphs of multitud- 




(Kedrawn from Harper's Magazine. By permission.) 

Richard B. Connolly 



I 



JUGGLING WITH THE (TTY TAX LEVIES. 107 

inous items comprised in the bills were right, they generally 
made np their minds to throw the responsibility of such 
examination upon the Governor, who had to approve of the 
measures, and in casting their votes would simply follow 
the lead of the New York members and respond aye to the 
roll call for the passage of the bills. 

In the City Levy of 1868, there was an innocent-looking 
paragraph of only five or six lines, which gave the Comp- 
troller of New York City authority " from time to time," 
to appoint and fix the compensation of so many clerks and 
employes " as Jie might deem essential to the effective 
discharge of the Department of Finance." Before he got 
through Avitli the " essential " part of this business, it was 
generally understood that a representative of nearly every 
Eepublican member in the Senate and Assembly who had 
voted " aye " for the Tax Levies was numbered among the 
sinecure Brigade of the Finance Department. 

" When a dog's brains are out, it is supposed to be dead," 
and when the Tax Levy Bills passed both Houses of the 
Legislature, you might suppose that that was their "finish." 
But it was not. For some mysterious hand, generally 
supposed to be Tweed's private secretary, (who was always 
" around " when the Tax Levies were under consideration, 
and especially when Conference Committees were appointed 
by both bodies to adjust any differences on the part of the 
Senate or Assembly in relation to the Levies,) made it his 
business to get the last handHng of the bills ere they 
went to the Clerk's desk to be engrossed for the signatures 
of the presiding officers before presentation to the Gov- 
ernor, and rnmor stated that this sly manipulator would 
adroitly slip into the officially endorsed coverings of the 
bills that had been before the Legislature, exact duplicates 
of the amended Tax Levies, with such new additions as 
were required to carry out the purposes of the King, and 
as the records of both Houses would show no objections to 



128 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

those additions (for tliey liad never been read in either 
body) the bills would go to the Governor as if these 
additions had been ratified by both Houses and they would 
thus receive his approval. 

An incident in connection with the Tax Levies, and to 
exemplify the items of '• jobbery" which they were supposed 
to contain, is perhaps worth appending : Just before the 
close of the Legislative session of 1868 — and when the 
Assembly, having cleared the Speaker's desk of all Senate 
bills, took a recess for an hour to enable the Senate to 
finish the third reading of bills which had been sent from 
the lower House, — a " mock " session was held, when 
Assemblyman " Tony " Hartman (always full of fun) being 
called to the Speaker's chair, kept the house in a roar by 
his excellent mimicry of the peculiarities of President 
Woodford of the Senate, and those of the Speaker of 
the House, and at the same time making most amusing 
"rulings." One of the members — I think it was Henry 
Nelson, representative of the Third Assembly District of 
Westchester County — to add to the fun of the recess, in- 
quired of the mock Speaker, if the City Tax Levy was 
before the House, and, receiving an affirmative answer, 
asked " unanimous consent " to insert in the Bill a provision 
for " an appropriation to Patrick Muldoon, for holding the 
shadow of Mayor Hoffman on a dark night, the sum of 
forty thousand dollars." This hit at the scores of similar 
appropriations contained in the Tax Levies, in theatrical 
parlance, " brought down the house," which was followed 
by another volley of laughter, when the mock Speaker 
replied : " If the gentleman from Chesterwester " — ^miscall- 
ing the county, to carry out the fun of the evening — " will 
strike out the words ' Mayor Hoffman ' and insert ' Gover- 
nor Fenton,' the Chair will decide his motion carried." 

To illustrate the spirit of the press at this period, I can- 
not do better than append an editorial of much force, 



SEVERE LASHING OF THE KING. 139 

written by a man of great political eminence. Horace 
Greeley at the close of the Civil War, which by his power- 
ful anti-slavery advocacy he had done so much to hasten, 
now, when the armed strife was ended, desired to do liis part 
toward cementing the shattered Union, and sethis heart upon 
going to Congress. In the fall of 1866 he obtained a nomi- 
nation, and was badly beaten. This defeat rankled in his 
bosom, and having somehow got the notion in his head that 
Tweed was the chief cause of his discomfiture, he kept "a 
rod in pickle " for the Boss. So, when a paragraph appeared 
in the local news of his paper, the Trilnme, stating that a 
young man who had recently held an office under the Tam- 
many City administration, had committed suicide, Mr. 
Greeley made up his mind to give expression to liis 
feelings, and this is the way he did it : 

" We woader if our readers know the terrorism of Tammany Hall. 
Look at the men wlio control it. William M. Tweed, rich with the 
plunder of a huadred jobs, fat, oily and dripping with the public 
wealth — the head and centre and front of every job that has disgraced 
Kew York for ten years. In a little while he has risen from obscurity 
to wealth and power, and all by the terrorism of Tammany Hall. His 
chief confederate is Peter B. Sweeny, who has also risen by the influ- 
ence of Tammany Hall. Sly, patient, hidden, never seeing the sun — 
the man who arranges the wires and shifts the scenes and intrigues — 
Sweeny is known as the Mephistophiles of Tammany. Then we have 
John T. HoflEman, who is kept by Tammany Hall as a kind of respect- 
able attache. His humble work is to wear good clothes and be always 
gloved, to be decorous and polite; to be as much a model of deportment 
as Mr. Turvydrop ; to repeat as often as need be, in a loud voice, sen- 
tences about 'honesty' and 'public welfare,' but to appoint to rich 
places such men as Mr. Sweeny. Hoffman is kept for the edification 
of the country Democrats, but all he has or ever can have comes from 
Tammany Hall. Then we have O'Gorman— the greediest man that ever 
came into Tammany Hall, we are told— elected as a Reformer, but like 
most R»formers, alas ! more ravenous and as'aiicious than the men they 
succeed. Then comes the stealthy and silent Purser — the Tammany 
'What-is-it' — who quietly piles up a large fortune out of the old 
clothes of Tammany Hall. Purser is the Shylock of the concern, and 
is good for anything, from a poor devil of a placeman's warrant for 



130 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

two weeks' salary up to the opening of Church Street— the richest kind 
of a placer. So they live, and fatten and grow rich, and aim to control 
the State. 

"All other Democratic organizations are owned by Tammany Hall — 
one and all are under the influence of this tyranny. Sometimes it is 
beaten and a popular ' Reformer ' elected. Tammany corrupts him, 
and in a fortnight the Reformer is carrying out the orders of Sweeney 
or dividing up his fees with some of its leaders. The leaders make the 
money, the followers give it. No one can hold a place under Tammany 
without being compelled to ' stand and deliver ' a portion of his pay 
whenever Mr. Sweeny or Mr. Tweed fancies ' the party needs some 
money.' This is the strength of Tammany Hall. Its leaders hold the 
Treasury as Rob Roy and his thieves held the Highland Passes. Who- 
ever comes their way must pay loll, for Tammany must live and its 
leaders must revel in wealth. Some poor devil of a placeman, driven 
to beggary, may kill himself, like the one who, the other day, found 
that to pay a tax of some kind, the Tammany Committee had quietly 
taken the remnant of his salary, some Tammany money-broker having 
discounted a portion of it for him in advance. Who cares ? Mr. 
Tweed will soon find a successor, and Mr. Purser will cash his warrant 
in the oiliest and quickest manner for twenty per cent." 

Horace Greeley was one of the three greatest editors 
tliis country has produced, and rivaled tlie elder James 
Gordon Bennett and Henry J. Raymond in the vigor and 
venom of his pen. He never stopped to mince words when 
he made up his mind to let himself out ; and yet, person- 
ally he was an amiable, kind-hearted man, as was evidenced 
by the fact that when Jefferson Davis, President of the 
Confederate States, was arrested and held in $100,000 bail, 
Mr. Greeley headed the list, with Commodore Yanderbilt 
and Gerrit Smith (the great Abolitionist advocate) taking 
upon themselves liabilities of $25,000 each, the remaining 
$25,000 being made up by citizens of Richmond, Ya. You 
doubtless remember that this action and his friendly leaning 
toward the conquered Southern States soured the extreme 
Radicals in his party, although it warmed the Democrats 
toward him ; and when, in 1872, he was nominated for the 
Presidency by what was called the Liberal Republicans of 
the country, and endorsed by the Democracy, Tammany 



UNSUCCESSFUL ASPIRATIONS OF A GREAT MAN. 131 

Hall (then, however, minus Tweed) gave him, notwith- 
standing his former vituperation of it, a very hearty support. 
But the 'result of the canvass was a disastrous defeat for 
Greeley, and about three weeks thereafter (Nov. 29, 1872) 
he died, believing, no doubt, with Wolscy, that, had he 
served God with half the zeal he had served the Republican 
party, " lie would not have so deserted '' him. 

It would seem to have been Greeley's fate to meet with 
disappointment in all his political aspirations, except when 
he ran for (^^ongress from one of the New York districts, in 
1848 and was elected to till a three months' vacancy. For, 
h\ 1861, at the breaking out of the Civil War, when he 
desired to obtain a seat in the D. S. Senate, he was defeated 
by William M. Evarts.K In 1864, deeming the Confederate 
cause moribund, he petitioned the President to send a 
Commissioner to confer with alleged Confederate represen- 
tatives in Canada, with a view of terminating the strife. 
Lincoln listened to the suggestion and appointed Greeley 
to inquire into the matter. But Greeley found his mission 
unsuccessful. Then he was defeated, when he again tried 
to reach Congress in 1866. In the following year he 
made earnest efforts to capture the Senatorial seat he 
had sought to obtain six years previously, but his liberal 
views on general amnesty barred him from success. In 1 869 
he was made a candidate for Comptroller of New York 
State on the Republican ticket, and defeated ; which fate 
overtook him again when, in 1872, he was a candidate for 
the Presidency. 



y4 



n \. ^a 



LETTEK XII. 

Memorable Erie Eailroad Contest — Judiciary of the 
Metropolis Used as Bulls and Bears — Action of 
AN Erie Stock-holder Against Judge Barnard and 
Commodore Vanderbilt for Joint Conspiracy — Mil- 
lions Expended in Litigation and Legislative Lubri- 
cation to Save Millions Filched from the People — The 
"Black Horse Cavalry" on the Eampage — Eagerness 
OF AN Unsophisticated Legislator to be Corrupted — 
Sudden Collapse of High Expectations — How Tweed 
Managed to be on Both Sides m Two Big Fights — 
Litigation Which Ended in Murder— The Body Found 
Floating in the North River. 

My dear Dean : 

In my last letter I stated my intentiou to refer to some 
incidents of peculiar interest which occurred during Mr. 
Tweed's Senatorial career, and with which he was some- 
what identified. Of these, perhaps, the most remarkable 
was that which was known as •' the great Erie Railway 
fight." 

There had long been considerable trouble in the Erie 
Hallway management; it was always more or less in hot 
water; but along about 1867-'68, at which time Daniel 
Di-ew had gotten Jay Gould and James Fisk, Jr. (as shrowd 
manipulators as himself) into the Board of Directors, the 
Erie Railway began to reach out for "Western connections, 
and Commodore Vanderbilt and his son William IL de- 
termined, if possible, to head off these ambitious designs 
and secure a monopoly of the carrying trade of the countiy 
for the New York Central Railroad, In accordance with 
this purpose, Vanderbilt, through his agents and brokers, 
began to buy Erie stock. But Drew, who was a fervent 
churchman, and believed in the preaching of the gospel and 
in the building and endowment of houses of worship, 

132 



AN UNPRECEDENTED RAILWAY CONTEST. 138 

managed also to devote about six days in the week to Wall 
Street and its presiding deity, and he soon " got on to the 
game ; " and, while Vauderbilt kept buying Erie stock, to 
the amount of nearly if not quite sixteen millions of 
dollars, the pious "old man," with the help of Gould and 
Fisk, had printing-presses at work, and kept issuing ad- 
ditional stock, nntil Vanderbilt discovered that, after all his 
large investment, he was no nearer his mark than when he 
first began to ' corner Erie.'' Ascertaining how Drew was 
"playing the game," Vanderbilt called off his agents and 
brokers, and turned his attention to litigation, in which 
Drew was called upon to refund fifty-eight thousand shares 
of stock " illegally issued;" Jay Gould was charged with 
"pocketing several millions"; and charges and counter- 
charges, in junctions and counter-injunctions were the.order 
of the day. The fight was a very bitter one, involving the 
arrest of the Erie Board of Directors, who were brought 
before Judge Barnard, and (at the suggestion, perhaps, 
of Tv.'eed who was on the side of Vanderbilt because, as 
he claimed, the Vanderbilts had always contributed liberally 
to the Democratic campaign fund) compelled to give heavy 
bail bonds, to appear and " show cause why tliey should not 
be committed for contempt," &c. Then Drew, Fisk, Gould 
and five other members of the Erie Board of Directors, 
finding the conditions becoming too hazardous for them, 
managed to escape, in rovvboats, across the Hudson River, 
during a fog, and took quarters at Taylor's hotel in Jersey 
City, in the State of New Jersey, so as to be out of the 
jurisdiction of the New York Courts. Thus entrenched, 
the Erie Directors began to fight back still more bitterly, 
and induced one of the Erie stockholders to commence an 
action for conspiracy against the Vanderbilts and Judge 
George G. Barnard, charging them with '• having entered 
into a combination to speculate in the stock of the Erie 
Kaiiway, and with using the process of the Courts for the 



134 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

purpose of aiding their speculations," ifec. Then a gang of 
thirty or forty men proceeded to Jersey City to kidnap 
Drew, Gould and Fisk, inspired thereto by the offered 
reward of fifty thousand dollars ! The best legal talent in 
the State was enlisted in this contest, and among those 
secured by the Vanderbilts was Charles O'Conor who, in 
open Court, denounced the Erie Directors as a " gang of 
thieves" who had illegally enriched their pockets to the 
sum of millions. 

It soon became evident that nothing could be done to 
settle the Erie fight in the Courts. One Judge, on an 
ex-parte statement of one side, would issue an order which 
another Judge on an ex-parte statement of the other side 
would immediately set aside ; and a Wall Street muddle, 
transferred to the Courts, made the Justices of the Supreme 
Court assume the character of bulls and bears, and the 
whole judiciary was seriously damaged in repute. Then 
the matter was transferred to the Legislature. Early in 
March, 1868, the following resolution was introduced in 
the State Senate and adopted by that body : 

" Wlierens, Grave charges have been made in the newspapers and 
before the Supreme Court in reference to the management of the Erie 
Railway Company, and that the general management of said company 
is Ciintrolled by persons who systematically make use of their positions 
to depreciate and destroy the value of the stock of said company, and 
that the directors of such company have issued a larger amount of 
stock than they are entitled by law to issue ; therefore, 

'' Resolved, That a Committee of five Senators be appointed to examine 
into the condition of such company and into the said charges, with 
power to send for persons and papers." 

This proceeding (emanating, it was supposed, from the 
Vanderbilt people) was followed in a day or two by a 
countermove on the part of the Erie Company, through 
tlie introduction of a bill in the Assembly to legalize the 
issue of ten million dollars' worth of stock by the Erie Rail- 
way Company ; and in the meantime, to forestall 



Fabulous inducements roll legislative aid. 135 

antagonistic proceedings on the part of the Legislature of 
the State of New York, they " persuaded" the New Jersey 
Legislature to grant large powers to the Erie Eailway 
Company, Gould having purchased a handsome residence 
in that State, and the other directors promising to follow 
suit (as a further inducement to the Legislature and 
Governor of New Jersey to favor their Company) ^vhile 
Gould also promised that the principal office of the Erie 
Railway Company should be located in Jersey City. 

It can readily be imagined that a bill proposing to legal- 
ize ten million dollars' worth of stock awakened unusual 
interest and spurred the lobby at Albany to feverish activity. 
Members of the Legislature who up to that time had been 
kicking themselves for being such fools as to come to the 
Legislature for the beggarly three hundred dollars then 
paid by the State for the services of a legislator during a 
session, (their pay now is fifteen hundred dollars and mile- 
age,) began to "scent the battle from afar," and hotel and 
boarding-house keepers who had been a little scary about 
" hanging up " accounts for a longer period than two weeks, 
began to be more affable to those of their guests who were 
legislative members, and to have more confidence in their 
prospective financial ability. Poker games at night began 
to flourish, and saloon-keepers joined in the general good 
feeling which prevailed in anticipation of the " good time 
coming." 

Fabulous amounts were promised, or said to be in store, 
for the friends of the Erie Bill. It was even stated, by 
some of the more enthusiastic of the country members 
(from that portion of the State through which the Erie rail- 
way runs, and the interests of whose constituents were 
wrapped up in the success of the railroad, upon which their 
own business advantages so much depended) that the Erie 
people were willing to "spend two millions, if necessary," 
to insure the success of the pending measure. There had 



136 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

been almost a Lenten fast in the Legislature in tlie matter 
of " jobs." Members were poor and hungry after the long 
abstinence of the session, which condition may be best 
described by relating an episode in which a new and very 
much disheartened member of the disgruntled body of 
statesmen figured. 

Popular belief accredited a member of the Legislature 
with ample opportunities for making a large fortune even 
in one term of ofiice ; consequently the hunt after legislative 
" honors " was brisk in the extreme. In one of the East- 
side Assembly Districts of the metropolis there was the 
wildest kind of a struggle for the legislative nomination. 
It was regarded as a prize of high value, and in the contest 
old friendships were broken, old associations sundered, and 
even family ties strained in the cyclone of excitement and 
discord arising out of the fight for the coveted honor. Each 
aspirant accused the others of seeking the ofiice only for 
what money they could make of it, and it was an open 
secret that the anxiety to get the ofiice was prompted by 
hopes of reaping substantial perquisites, which were mys- 
teriously described as " bones." After a bitter contest, the 
choice at length fell on one Louis Winckler, a struggling 
saloon-keeper, who had acquired a certain popularity 
through his frank and open disposition. It may be instructive 
to note here that all but three of the dozen aspirants for 
the nomination followed the same laudable calling. Never- 
theless, all irritation subsided after the nomination, and 
Winckler was triumphantly elected. It is needless to say 
that Winckler was, as indeed under the circumstances he 
had reason to be, a proud man. He knew, or thought he 
knew, that he had at last got the chance of his life. Nor 
did he have any hesitancy in giving expression to his 
expectations to rescue himself from comparative poverty. 
He had spent nearly a thousand dollars in the canvass, 
including three hundred and fifty dollars delivered as an 



i IMPATIENCE OF A HUNTER FOR "BONES." 137 

assessment to Tammany Hall, but such a sum was not to be 
deemed of much account in contemplation of what he was 
to make at the State Capital. Some of the wags, who knew 
something of his expectations in this direction, and who 
from experience could inform him, that, whatever hope 
there might be of making a " stake " after two or three 
years in the Legislature, when one had learned " to know 
the ropes," there was little opportunity for a first year 
member, resolved to have some fun, and joined in congrat- 
ulating him on his chance to make a " barrel of money." 
Up to the day of his departure for the opening of the 
Legislature, these practical jokers had "jollied" him with 
visions of coming wealth, one of the crudest of them advis- 
ing him to be sure to open a bank account at Albany 
immediately after his arrival in that city. Every Friday 
evening, after his weekly return from the State Capital, 
some one of them would call upon him to ascertain the 
amount of " stakes " he had made that week. At first he 
would say it was a " little early yet, alretty," and that things 
would be all right, " for sure "; but his tormentors kept at 
it Friday after Friday evening with ruthless persistency, 
and at last some of them hinted that he was " getting fooled 
by the gang up in Albany," while others took an opposite 
view and continued to buoy him up with bright anticipa- 
tions. Between hopes and fears he kept himself in check 
until the period arrived for the usual recess of the Legisla- 
ture over Washington's birth-day. More than six weeks of 
the session had elapsed and his eager hands had not clasped 
the first cent of the expected spoils. He could stand the 
strain no longer, and he determined, in a business-like way, 
to ascertain where the hitch lay. So, on his way down to 
the City, he sought out on the train the Hon. Anthony 
Hartman, a countryman of his, better known as "Tony", 
Hartmau, and said to him: \ 

^^Yot in hell dis mean, Tony ? Six veeks have I alretty 



138 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

in Albany been, and, nichts kommt heraus. Somebody 
must cheats me. I vants square deal, by Gott!" 

"But you must have patience, my boy," said Hartman- 
suppressing his laughter ; " wait a little longer." 

" Der Teufel mit such Legislatoor ; it humbug is ! Tell 
me, Tony, ven beesness begins ? " 

" Well," replied Tony, "we have done lots of business 
up here this session." 

" Oh, dot's not vot I mean, Tony, but ven vill de bones 
be given oud?" 

His friend Tony now found it necessary to excuse him- 
self and, borrowing the well-known expression of Samuel 
J. Tilden, said he would " see him later." 

To resume my narrative : Everything after the introduc- 
tion of the Erie fight seemed to favor the too oft postponed 
expectations of the "gentleman from New York" and 
others of like hopes, and the railroad quarrel was on all 
hands regarded as a fair and legitimate " feast of bones." 
Two huge speculators (sometimes spelled without initial 
" s ") Drew and Yanderbilt, were striving to get the advan- 
tage of each other, and the general idea was that whatever 
could be "bled" from them would be legitimately earned. 
The prize was so dazzling that the members who were "up 
to snuff " determined to do no business through the lobby, 
but go straight to headquarters. Every man was, however, 
so suspicious of his neighbor that he feared the humiliating 
trick of being " sold out." Coteries of two or three were 
formed for protection — in fact, the members were divided 
into coteries throughout the House. The Boss element 
in the Senate was feared particularly by the New York 
boys, who wanted to be "let alone," and a caucus was held 
at Stanwix Hall, and a combination was formed for protec- 
tion against the " leaders." 

*"_ Legislative scenes and doings at this time were unusual 
and eccentric. All ordinary business was comparatively 



BLACK HORSE CAVALRY ON THE RAMPAGE. 139 

neglected. Knots and groups gathered about the hallways 
and cloak rooms of the Capitol, talking in undertones. 
"When night came, squads of half a dozen were seen going 
about from room to room at the hotels, learning the news 
or trying to ascertain one another's position. A source of 
much debate was the " tariff rates " which ought to prevail. 
Some " two-and- six-penny " fellows suggested one thousand 
dollars a head ; but they were smiled at for their lack of 
boldness and for their unsophisticated' innocence. The 
" rate " vibrated between two thousand and three thousand 
dollars, and some " upper crust " chaps, who ran Sunday 
schools at home and wore white neckties in the House, were 
unwilling to talk of anything less than five thousand dol- 
lars ! The Erie people promised at the outset one thousand 
dollars — five hundred down and five hundred when their 
bill became a law. But none of the old birds could be 
caught with " such chaff." And the Drew men, at the out- 
set, thus won for themselves a reputation for chaapness 
which handicapped their cause. The paltry offer of one 
thousand dollars (only half cash) was contemned, in view 
of the magnificent proportions of the wealth of the Yan- 
derbilts. The friends of the latter had not, however, en- 
tered the Assembly portion of the field of battle ; but they 
were expected; for Boss Tweed, when interviewed by some 
of the New York Assemblymen on the subject, told them 
to " Stand firm, and not commit themselves," and the first 
offer from Erie was, therefore, regarded as "an insult," 
and rejected. 

I Thus the canvass went on until the last of the leg^al arofu- 
ments on the Bill before the Railroad Committee of the 
Assembly had been heard, and both sides had rested their 
cases. Then the Committee withdrew for an executive 
session, and the result of its deliberations was anxiously 
awaited. The excitement during this executive session was 
like that over the sitting of a jury when " out" in a great 



140 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

trial. The Committee was tardy in making up its collective 
mind, and the more obstreperous of the members in waiting 
had almost determined to take the Bill out of the Commit- 
tee's hands by a vote of the House. It leaked out that the 
Committee stood four for Vanderbilt, or anti-Erie, and 
three for Drew, or in favor of the bill. Meantime, those 
in control of the large body of expectants had become im- 
patient over the delay of the gentlemen of the Committee, 
who seemed to be '' waiting for something," and they asked 
for and obtained the introduction in the Senate of a dupli- 
cate of the bill under consideration in the Assembly. Two 
causes existed for this. In the first place, the filibusters in 
the Senate who were " on the watch " were jealous of their 
compeers in the Assembly. If the bill were not passed in 
the Assembly, then there could be no chance whatever for 
business in the '' Upper House ; " and, secondly, if the Bill 
were introduced in the Senate, it could be defeated in the 
Yanderbilt interest, or it could be passed in the Drew in- 
terest. In short, the Erie Bill was a gold mine which 
those of the Senators who were in the " deal " were unwill- 
ing to let the " smart ones " in the Assembly work alone. 
Hence the sudden introduction of the Erie Bill in the 
Senate. 

Things were in this condition until the evening of March 
26, when two startling rumors terrified all sides and parties. 
They were that Yanderbilt and Drew had come to a sort of 
compromise in New York, and that the lobbyists in the 
interests of the latter had suddenly withdrawn. A howl of 
indignation went up in every direction. Some of the 
members, more shrewd than others, made a rush for the 
subordinate lobbyists, and " wished to close " with them on 
the terms first proposed — five hundred dollars cash down. 
But the play was over ; the star actors had gone home ; the 
terms now so satisfactory were no longer offered. Dismay 
and distraction seized the several coteries which twenty- 



RESIGNATION OF AN INDIGNANT ASSEMBLYMAN. I4l 

four hours previously had beeu seriously contemplating 
" raising the ante," and individual members rushed about 
frantically as though each had been the actual loser of 
thousands of dollars. A most magnificent prospect of 
wealth had indeed vanished into air. The great war was 
supposed to be over ; the attacking party had ingloriously 
left the field, and the victory was with its adversaries. 
l^ext morning the Assembly Railroad Committee reported 
unanimously against the bill, and the report was agreed to 
by a vote of eighty -three to thirteen — thirty -two dis- 
gruntled members (among whom were most of the As- 
semblymen of New York City, who were almost ready to 
shoot Tweed for telling them to "stand firm") being 
absent at roll-call. 

Within a day or two, a member of the Assembly, E. M. 
K. Glenn, from the second district of "Wayne County, made 
a statement in the Chamber that corrupt practices had been 
introduced by the lobby ; that he had been approached and 
offered a bribe of five hundred dollars if he would vote for 
the Erie Bill ; and he asked for a Committee of Investiga- 
tion, which was appointed, and in the course of a few days 
this Committee reported that it had examined the books of 
the Erie Railway Company, as well as those of the New 
York Central Company, and found that "no money had 
been appropriated, drawn or used for influencing the Legis- 
lature." So glaring a sham, on the face of it, was this re- 
port that Mr. Glenn, indignant and disgusted, would no 
longer remain a member of such a body. He promptly 
resigned his seat. In the meantime, the Senate Select 
Committee reported that the Erie Company had " acted 
illegally in the issue of ten millions of stock," and recom- 
mended the passage of a Bill to " prevent such reprehen- 
sible actions in the future." A minority of the same 
Committee, in a report presented at the same time, declared 
the " extra issue of stock by the directors was valid," and 



142 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

commended their action. Then Jay Gould came to the 
front (in the keeping of a ISTew York Deputy Sheriff) at 
the Delavan House, Albany, to look after his bill, while 
Horace Greeley took a hand in the melee for Vanderbilt 
as against Erie ; and, after considerable pulling and haul- 
ing, the friends of the Erie measure resolved to make an 
effort to force their confirming Act through the Senate, 
and succeeded in so doing by a vote of seventeen ayes 
to twelve nays, one member being excused from voting, 
and two members being absent. Subsequently, the same 
measure — not the original Assembly bill, but an amended 
Erie Bill— passed the Assembly, and doubtless the " Black 
Horse Cavalry " got some forage after all. 

As the term ' ' Black Horse Cavalry " may not be under- 
stood by you, it may be proper for me to state that, as 
applied to the State Legislature, it was understood to be an 
organization which was potent in the Assembly of 1868- 
'69-'70, the object of which was to allow no bill to pass the 
House which was intended to benefit anybody, and to 
threaten the passage of any possible bill intended to injure 
anybody, until they were through their leader consulted, 
and the matter was presented to them in a profitable light. 

The tactics in reference to a bill which struck at some 
wealthy corporation or combination was to so far progress 
it in the Committee of the Whole as to show that it was 
likely to pass unless something was done. Then, when 
that something was done, the bill was killed and the Cav- 
alry made a charge at some other corporation. At one 
session, when the Cavalry had expected some consideration 
from the Yanderbilts, and did not receive any, they hunted 
over the files, one morning, and having the numerical 
strength, ordered every bill they could find, calculated to 
injure the Vanderbilts, to a " third reading." This brought 
the Vanderbilt's agent " to Limerick," and when the bills 
came up on final passage, those men who had recorded 



INVESTIGATION WHICH WAS NOT INVESTIGATION. 143 

themselves in favor of " ordering tlio bills to a tliird read- 
ing," did not hesitate to change front in a body and vote 
against and kill them. 

The passage of the Erie Bill by the Senate was followed 
by boisterously vehement charges of corruption. The public 
press was explicit in statements that one Senator especially 
(who had first signed a report antagonistic to Erie and after- 
wards added his vote to complete the seventeen necessary 
to pass the Erie Bill) had obtained fifteen thousand dollars 
from one side in the fight, then twenty thousand dollars from 
the other side, and, not yet satisfied, wanted one thousand 
dollars more for his son, who acted as his private secretary. 
It is proper to add, perhaps, that the Senator thus pointed 
out was not Tweed ; for Tweed was not a member of the 
Investigating Committee referred to, and he did not have 
his son at Albany ; but it was rumored that Tweed did a 
pretty stiff business during the Erie fight, in arranging for 
votes, of which the gentlemen who owned the votes knew 
nothing whatever. This, again, might have been mere 
idle gossip. 

However, Senator Hale, indignant over the scandal thus 
created, presented a resolution reciting the pubhc charges 
of corruption, and asked that a committee of investigation 
from the Senate be appointed. The resolution was adopted 
and the Committee appointed. Shortly after this, an am- 
nesty was declared and another compromise made between 
Yanderbilt and Drew, which ended hostilities, so far as the 
Legislature was concerned. 

But as soon as Vanderbilt was out of the contest with 
Drew, Gould and Fisk made a combination with Tweed, 
(who all through the Court fights and Legislative contests 
had been on the Vanderbilt or anti-Erie side, but who, like 
" Bre'r Kabbit," in the fairy story, " lay low,") and in ac- 
cordance with this change of base, Tweed was made a di- 
rector of the Erie Company — the bargain being that Gould 



144 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and Fisk were to so manage tlie affairs of their railroad 
and its influence as to secure the votes of the Southern tier 
of counties in this State, through which the road ran, in 
favor of tlie election of John T. Hoffman as Governor the 
ensuing Fall, and Tweed in return was to manipulate the 
Courts in the interest of the Erie, through two of his judges, 
Barnard and Cardozo. Then, in order to get square with 
Yanderbilt for all the trouble he had caused them, Gould 
and Fisk undertook to secure control of the Albany & 
Susquehanna Railroad, which would give to Erie a large 
portion of the New England trade that had heretofore gone 
to Yanderbilt over the New York Central, This resulted 
in a bitter controversy betwen the old Board of Directors 
of the Albany and Susquehanna Company (backed, no 
doubt, by Yanderbilt), in which repeated injunctions, as in 
the previous Erie litigation, were procured by the old man- 
agement of the Albany Companj^, from Judge Peckham at 
Albany, and these injunctions were vacated, upon applica- 
tion of the Erie people, by Judge Barnard in New York ; 
while Judge Peckham, repudiating Judge Barnard's orders 
to vacate, would issue notices for contempt proceedings, 
and so forth. 

Gould and Fisk had now secured the Grand Opera 
House, at the corner of Eighth avenue and Twenty-third 
street. New York City, for the main ofiices of the Erie 
Railway Company, where they established their personal 
headquarters. Miss Josie Mansfield, who figured somewhat 
prominently in the newspapers at that time as the chere 
amie of James Fisk, jr,, procured or was provided with a 
house in Twenty-third street, adjoining the Opera House, 
where, it was alleged. Courts were substantially held by 
Judge Barnard, at evening or night, and from which injunc- 
tions and orders of different kinds would proceed, while — 
the Sheriff and his deputies being under the control of 
Tweed— the papers issued by Judge Peckham for contempt 



MURDER OF AN AMATEUR PROCESS SERVER. 145 

proceedings could not be promptly served; and, finally, 
Gould and Fisk, to make security doubly secure, began to 
absolutely refuse admittance at their offices in the Opera 
House to any one not known as an endorsed friend. At 
length, a new order was procured from Judge Peckham to 
punish Gould and Fisk for contempt, and so determined 
was the President of the Albany and Susquehanna Com- 
pany this time to have the papers properly served, that he 
had his own son authorized to go to 'New York to make the 
service upon Gould and Fisk. The Susquehanna people 
now felt assured of success. But no return was made upon 
that writ ; for the next day after his arrival the body of 
the President's son was found floating in the Hudson Kiver, 
a corpse. 

I shall not pursue this railroad quarrel any further at 
this time, although I may have something more to say of 
Gould and Fisk. It was only the connection of the fight 
with the Legislature during the period of the reign of the 
Boss that induced me to introduce it in this letter, 
presenting as it does a phase of legislation which, if not 
wholly extinct, has never, since the session referred to, 
offered such opportunities or been attended with such 
disastrous results to the hopes of the lobby and of members 
of the Legislature, who, like the " gentleman from I^ew 
York" already described, were anxious for " bones" to be 
given out. 

I cannot close this letter, however, without adding as a 
" finish " that, early in the session of the Senate, in 1869, 
after a long series of Summer sittings, Senator Hale's Com- 
mittee of Investigation of alleged bribery and corruption 
attributed to members of the preceding Legislature re- 
ported " not proven." They discovered considerable smoke, 
but no fire. It was said that the Committee attempted to 
ascertain what consideration the then Governor, Fenton, 
received for his signature to the Erie Bill of that session ; 



146 THIRTY YEAES OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

but tlie Erie Railwaj people declined to answer, on tlie 
plea that the resolution under which the Committee acted 
did not call for that information. It was also asserted that 
when ex- Senator Thomas Murphy was on the witness stand 
he stated that, upon applying to Jay Gould for a contribu- 
tion to the Republican State Committee, Gould declined, 
upon the ground that " he had already contributed $20,000 
for Governor Fenton's expenses." This portion of the 
evidence, however, did not appear in Senator Hale's report. 




tJ{e(lrawii from Harper's Magazine. Iiy permission. Copyright, 1S85, by Harper & Brotliersj 

Jay Godld. 



LETTER XIII. 

Surroundings of a Local Political Boss — Keen Business 
Shrewdness of a New York Alderman — His Onerous 
Unofficial Duties— Daily Attendance at Police 
Courts, Wakes and Funerals — How He Managed to 
"Run" an Undertaker, and Fix Obsequies to Suit 
his Personal Convenience — A Bar-room Bouncer and 
the Peculiarities of his Occupation. 

My DEAR Dean: 

It was in tlie montli of December, 1868, that 1, in com- 
pany witli an acquaintance, entered the ground floor of a 
small two-story building situated at the junction of two 
streets in the lower portion of the City of New York. 

It was already dark, being past Y o'clock. The weather 
was bitterly cold. Men, women and children hurried along 
the crowded thoroughfares in this densely-populated sec- 
tion of the City. It was what is known as the tenement 
district, where thousands of people were huddled together 
within a small area. The tenements were occupied by the 
working masses, and one of these tenements alone " accom- 
modated " as many as two hundred families. It may be 
proper to say here, that the City is much improved since 
then, with respect to the homes of the working classes. 
We were attracted thither by glaring lights in the two 
large windows which fronted on the main street, and the 
not less brilliant illumination in the smaller window front- 
ing the intersecting street. But, truth to tell, there were 
other attractions. A sign about twelve inches square, 
painted in flaming red, on which was printed in bold white 
letters, " Hot Tom and Jerry," was suspended by a wire 
cord over the main entrance. This sign did duty only in 

147 



14S THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the Winter season, and on the approach of warm weather 
was summarily retired, and replaced (as more in consonance 
with the character of the season) with another of less in- 
flamed complexion, composed of white pasteboard, bearing 
the enticing and less m}'stic words, " Milk Punches " and 
"Sherry Cobblers." 

For the obvious purpose of adding dignity to the con- 
cern, by substantial proof that more patronage flowed to it 
than to any two or three similar places of business in the 
neighborhood, the outer portion of the sidewalk, for the 
entire length of the building which, on the main street, 
ran one hundred feet, was ornamented with casks and 
barrels, placed one over the other to the height of four or 
five feet, and obstructively occupying four feet of width of 
the sidewalk, leaving the patient and submissive pedestrian 
to get along as best he could. This display, which indi- 
cated the number as well as the bibulous capacity of his 
customers and patrons, the distinguished proprietor himself 
personally revised every day, shifting about with the air of 
an artist or a chess-player the several casks and barrels 
adding to the height here and lessening it there, taking 
possession of new portions of the sidewalk at one point and 
abandoning his position at another, thus destroying the 
monotony which would otherwise have attended the display, 
just as many prudent and sagacious housewives, without 
the slightest scruple, shift the various pieces of their parlor 
and drawing-room furniture, from time to time, in the 
endeavor to impress their visitors that there had been 
added something new. 

This imposing body of evidence of an increased and 
rapidly increasing trade made, it must be admitted, an im- 
pression approximating to wonder upon large numbers of 
people, while in others it caused no surprise ; in fact, it was 
asserted by the latter, in a logical way, that it could not be 
otherwise, considering the political power and enormous 



DUTIES OF A POPULAR ALDERMAN. 149 

patronage of the proprietor. There were, however, some 
keen observers who were disposed to resent this panorama 
of casks and barrels as a concrete libel on their community, 
averring that, absorbent as some of them might be, it gave 
a grossly exaggerated idea of their general bibulous capacity. 
However this may be, certain it is that, on the part of all 
the other liquor dealers in the neighborhood, there 
existed a covert jealousy of these and other evidences of 
unusual prosperity. 

I say " covert " advisedly, for it would have been neither 
wise nor profitable to inveigh against the conditions which 
diverted trade away from them. They themselves largely 
contributed, only four years previously, to elect that busi- 
ness ri . al an Alderman, and although, after the first elec- 
tion, their enthusiasm for him as one of the craft had con- 
siderably abated, yet the Alderman's pertinacity and talent 
for acquisition were such, and his advances on the road to 
political ascendency so rapid, that it was idle for them to 
make an attempt to resist the tide, even after his first year 
in ofiice. Within that time, he had introduced as many as 
seven distinct resolutions in the Common Council, in favor 
of the workingman. They were well-worded, and had, as 
was universally admitted by his constituents, "the right 
ring about them." Of course, malicious persons averred 
that the Alderman himself never wrote them ; but this may 
be said of any man ; and it is well known to historians 
that such great men as Edmund Burke and Sir Horace 
Walpole introduced, in the English House of Commons, 
many resolutions not written by their own hands. Assistants 
were properly employed for work of this kind, because of 
the exacting duties of a graver and more comprehensive 
character. 

And 80 it was with Alderman Sheehan. Indeed, if the truth 
must be told, (and I say this without intending any reflec- 
tion on the memory of either Burke or Walpole) never was 



150 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

either of these English statesmen at any period of his career 
overwhehned with a weight of public burdens equal to 
that which taxed the intellect and almost oVerpowered the 
energies of this remarkable man. It would be idle to 
attempt even a summary of his public duties. Burke and 
Walpole, in their time, gave close attention to their duties 
in the House of Commons, as Alderman Sheehan did to 
his in the Common Council ; but there the similarity ends. 
Alderman Sheehan, in addition to this, held levees in the 
lobby of the City Hall in the afternoon. He visited the 
Police Courts every morning, and, by a suavity of manner 
to which Burke and Walpole were utter strangers, " influ- 
enced" the presiding Justice to regard with lenity the 
peccadilloes, eccentricities and frolics, more or less violent 
— but usually violent — of a large number of the Alderman's 
constituents who were in the habit of appearing before the 
magistrate. This task, and the diplomacy necessary to 
accomplish it, were rendered all the more delicate by the 
fact that the irregularities which attracted the attention of 
the police were largely the result of imbibitions at the 
Alderman's corner liquor store, the preceding evening. 

But these attendances at court formed only a small fraction 
of his duties. Indeed, they may be termed only the orna- 
mental part of his work. There were far graver problems 
to encounter during the rest of the day. Being a man of 
large philanthropy, death in the family of any of his con- 
stituents deejily affected him. There were necessarily many 
such sad occurrences in so dense a community as the one 
under consideration. Many- of the deceased had been his 
supporters politically. Moreover, they had been his cus- 
tomers for some years ; but the statement of this fact 
involves no insinuation that it had any direct bearing on 
their premature demise. 

It sometimes happened that peculiar situations presented 
themselves^situations which would have puzzled any other 



A BAR-ROOM BOUNCER. 151 

man than an expert politician. In all reason, no man 
should be expected to attend two or three funerals the 
same day ; but so exacting were the conditions of public 
life, under which the Alderman lived and ruled, that it 
was incumbent upon him to attend the funeral of every 
man, woman and child who died in his special domain. 
With pain, I must acknowledge that this was done, not 
invariably as a tribute to the virtues of the dead, but as a 
diplomatic appeal for the votes of the living. 

It was also necessary for him to attend all the wakes 
within his territory ; but this was a simple matter, for he 
could make several visits on the same night when the sev- 
eral corpses lay still. It was altogether different when the 
corpses were in motion, on the day of the funeral, at about 
the same hour, and when often, perhaps, carried in different 
directions to their last resting-places. For a man of his vast 
experience and unbounded resources, however, who had 
graduated in all the stations and sub-stations of local poli- 
tics, from the bar-room bouncer to the Chairmanship of the 
Assembly District Committee, to surmount a difficulty of 
the nature referred to, was mere child's play. 

At this point it is advisable to explain what is meant by 
a " bar-room bouncer," lest your English notions may con- 
found him with a person who bounces, dances and twists 
around like " Jump Jim Crow," or who performs acrobatic 
tricks for the amusement of his patrons. A bar-room 
bouncer in 'Hew Tork City is a very different and far more 
important individual. His functions are athletic, and even 
heroic. He represents the bar-room idea of order and ex- 
ecutive authority, and with a contempt of danger which 
would win him honors on the battle field, by force and arms 
he summarily, and often violently, ejects, at the mere nod of 
his employer, any hilarious customer whose departure from 
decorum seems bordering on delirium or provocative of 
disturbance ; because it is well-known that hilarity on such 



152 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

occasions is contagious. This duty may appear at first sight 
to be a mere vulgar exhibition of physical force, but on 
closer investigation you will discover that the bouncer, with 
a keen discrimination and delicate discretion which can only 
be acquired by long experience associated with natural saga- 
city, confines the exercise of his assumed police power to 
those who are known to have no more money to spend. It 
requires no argument to establish the soundness of the 
doctrine that a man who has money and is ready to spend it 
in a liquor shop cannot, by any fiction or rule of law, equity, 
or common sense, be construed into a disturber, no matter 
how foul his language or violent his behavior. 

To return from gay to grave, three funerals were sched- 
uled to take place on the same day and about the same hour, 
all of which the Alderman was expected to attend. How 
was it to be done ? It required the genius of such a man to 
solve the difiiculty, and the Alderman did solve it. On the 
night before the interment, he sent a special messenger 
for one Mr. Corlies, a gentleman who enjoyed a practical 
monopoly of burying those who needed such services in 
that portion of the City. Mr. Corlies himself was a citizen 
of considerable weight in that community. It was well- 
known that he basked in the sunshine of the Alderman's 
friendship and confidence. This, in itself, considerably aug- 
mented his importance, and as a consequence extended the 
sphere of his sombre occupation. 

But there were even stronger reasons why he obeyed the 
summons with an alacrity which would have befitted the 
servitor of a Koman Pro-consul. The Alderman had con- 
ferred upon him many special favors — always, however, at 
the expense of the public. Besides the melancholy business 
of undertaker, Mr. Corlies maintained a livery stable, and 
was obliged to use in both avocations a large number of 
horses. From old age, or disease, or from being worn out 
in the service of the dead, several of these animals became 



TRIUMPHS OF STRATEGY. 152 

decrepit and useless. Apart from being skinned for their 
hides, they were fit for only one thing, and that was to be 
put on the " pay-roll " to work for the Corporation of the 
City of New York, at a per diem salary of two dollars 
per carcass. By the political influence of the Alderman, 
four of the most forlorn and uncanny of Mr. Corlies' beasts 
were then enjoj^ing the dignity of a place on the City 
pay-roll as " teams." 

It is unnecessary here to recount other favors conferred 
on Mr. Corhes. Sufiice it to say, he would have been 
a rank ingrate had he not employed all the means at his 
command to extricate his benefactor from the dilemma 
Avhich confronted him. After various plans had been 
discussed and considered, that of a joint and harmonious 
funeral was suggested by the Alderman, whose policy on 
all occasions, was, as he or Tennyson would express it, " to 
take hands all 'round." But this was found to be injudi- 
cious, if not impracticable, for, after consultation with the 
head bar-tender, the Alderman reported " that at least two 
of the corpses while living had often ' scrapped ' and ' never 
made up.' " It was finally agreed that in the exercise of 
his functions, next day, Mr. Corlies should start the funeral 
processions at intervals of one hour apart, and that, as the 
burial grounds were far beyond the limits of the City, which 
necessitated the crossing of ferries, the Alderman could ac- 
company each of the "remains" in turn as far as the 
ferry, and head the procession in every case. This the 
Alderman did, being always careful, when each procession 
halted at the ferry, to go to the coach of the chief mourners, 
and with a lachrymose countenance condole with its afflicted 
occupants. 

But, as I shall have more to say about Alderman Sheehan 
in a subsequent letter, I shall not further encroach on your 
patience at this time. 



LETTER Xiy. 

Diamond Days of the Ring — When the Professional Politi- 
cian WAS IN HIS Glory — A Perpetual Smile and Prodig- 
ious Gem his Stock in Trade — How Favorites of the 
Ring Who Had Never Read a Law Book Became Law- 
yers—When Judge Barnard Had " Some Fun With the 
Boys " — Preliminaries to a Local Convention— Prepos- 
terous Attempt of an Unslated Nominee to Question a 
Local Boss about a Primary. 

My dear Dean: 

One of the most suave, sleek and oleaginous persons on 
earth is the New York professional politician, when things 
are going his way. There are no bounds to his geniality, 
no limit to his apparent friendship, no stint to his flattery. 
He wears a perpetual smile, and he beams with affection on 
all persons whose acquaintance and friendship he deems it 
profitable to cultivate. His all-round sociability and jovi- 
ality make personal friends for himself as well as for his 
Boss at every turn. Be it a wedding, a pic-nic, or an out- 
ing, he is sure to be the " life " of the occasion, while at a 
wake or a funeral he wears a countenance of becoming 
solemnity. 

Thrown as we are amidst the storms and strifes of this 
life, and obliged to walk the thorny paths of a wicked and 
selfish world, where cross-grained men and women make so 
many lives unhappy, this beaming, radiant character is like 
an oasis in the desert, ever fresh and friendly, always wel- 
comed and almost caressed. So adroitly does he ply his 
calling that he rarely offends any one, no matter how great 
the provocation. He is " posted " on all questions affecting 
the municipal government, the current topics of the day, 

- ■ - ,154 



MEMORIES OF THE DIAMOND DYNASTY. 155 

and is familiar with the history of men in public life for 
the past half century. Twenty years ago and over, he was, 
to a greater extent, perhaps, than to-day, the friend of the 
liquor dealer. At any hour of the evening, especially when 
election time drew near, he might have been seen lounging 
affectionately about the bar of the leading saloon-keeper 
of his district, discussing the virtues of the Boss and pros- 
pects of " the party." 

Had there been any doubt of his identity, it might have 
been easily determined by the size of his diamond and the 
conspicuous position it occupied upon his person. It was 
so much superior in dimension and brilliancy to other dia- 
monds, that it served not only to designate the individuality 
of the wearer, but to signal his approach to his admirers 
nearly a block away. The politician who had not got a 
diamond on his bosom was of little account among his fel- 
lows, and was looked upon as having neglected his oppor- 
tunities. Its size and lustre were commonly regarded as a 
measure of his professional success, and a passport into the 
innermost circle of the "high-toned gang," of which he 
was a member. Next to his readiness to oblige, and his 
still greater readiness to promise, it was almost his best 
recommendation to his neighbors, for its lustre convinced 
them that the wearer was " solid " in politics. But the days 
of the politicians' diamond glory are well nigh gone — at 
least, diamonds are no longer a distinctive feature of the 
New York politician. They went out with Boss Tweed, 
who set the political fashion, and who wore the most bril- 
liant diamond of all. 

When Mr. Jones and myself entered the saloon of Alder- 
man Sheehan on that December evening of 1868, as related 
in the preceding letter, we received a most cordial greeting 
from Mr. Daniel Breezy, who happened to be there at the 
time taking a little refreshment. 

I had enjoyed only a slight acquaintance with Mr. Breezy ; 



156 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

indeed, up to this evening, although I was his near neigh- 
bor, he had never taken any further notice of me than to 
extend a mere bow of recognition. It should be observed 
that Mr. Breezy's salutations were invariably accompanied 
with an uncommonly affable smile. On this particular even- 
ing, he was fairly bubbling over with geniality and with a 
spirit of hospitality which was more or less distressing to us. 
" Dan " Breezy was a man about thirty-five years of age, 
a little over the medium height, of somewhat athletic build, 
with a quick, furtive eye, a florid complexion and a flourish- 
ing brown moustache. He was dressed in the best of style 
and, of course, wore a diamond in his shirt front. Almost 
from boyhood he had held public positions, of one kind or 
another, and was at that time enjoying a handsome stipend 
as one of Tweed's " shiny hat brigade." Shortly before 
the time I speak of he had been admitted to the New York 
Bar, without going through the formality of a regular ex- 
amination. He had never read any law books, knew noth- 
ing of, and cared nothing for, the doctrines of Blackstone 
or Kent ; but, as an off -set to this, he was skilled to a refined 
degree in the art of handling Primaries. Statutes have 
been passed in recent years regulating Primaries ; but in 
those days there were no legal incumbrances in the way of 
a free and unrestricted Primary. Hence Mr. Breezy had 
no occasion to read even a statute to qualify himself as a 
manipulator of Primaries. Those who manipulate the 
machinery now-a-days have to read recent enactments 
on the subject, and must be more careful. As Mr. Breezy 
lield a lucrative sinecure in one of the Public Departments, 
there was no occasion for him to enter into the drudgery of 
his profession. Besides, had necessity driven him to prac- 
tice law for a living, it would have entailed upon him an 
obligation to read books — at least, some books; a thing 
which, if not impossible, -would have been a task of e^eat 



LAWYERS MADE TO ORDER. 157 

difficulty, and one altogether foreign to his natural taste and 
instincts. 

You in England, who have such ancient and circuitous 
forms for admission to the Bar, may be puzzled as to how 
Mr. Breezy, with liis lack of even rudimentary qualifica- 
tions, could have entered a profession which is classified as 
" learned ; " therefore, a few words of explanation may be 
necessary to account for the phenomenon. Besides, it is 
only just that this should be elucidated, lest you might en- 
tertain the erroneous impression that admissions generally 
to the Kew York Bar were of like character. The process 
of admission then was, and it is still more stringent now, 
that an examination be held in open Court to test the quali- 
fications of applicants ; and to that end the General Term 
of the Supreme Court appointed three members of the 
Bar to conduct such examinations and report on the quali- 
fications of applicants ; whereupon the General Term might 
admit those deemed to be worthy. This rule was strictly 
observed when admission was sought by ordinary persons, 
such as graduates of colleges, and those who had been 
studying law for years in lawyers' offices. !N^ot so with the 
Political Princes in the reign of Tweed. The " rules " 
were altogether under the control of the General Term, 
which was then composed of Judges Barnard, Cardozo and 
Ingraham, giving Tweed at least a clear working majority. 

It is a well-established principle that there is no rule 
without an exception. In confirmation of this maxim, 
fourteen political " bloods," most of them members of the 
Legislature, who, while suspected of many things, were 
never before suspected of having read a law book, were 
treated to a " special " examination in a separate room from 
that in which the common herd of applicants were exam- 
ined. The order was issued by Tweed that they should be 
" made lawyers of," but in order to avoid any unnecessary 
publicity of this new accession and acquisition to the Bar, 



158 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Justice Barnard ordered that tliey be concealed in one of 
the rooms of the Court House, where they were to wait 
until the Court was ready to put them through the " de- 
grees." 

While the favored fourteen were hidden in this room, a 
noted character in local politics, Paddy Burns — a man of 
thick- set frame, with a broad, huge face and a capacious 
mouth, which assumed a variety of expressions as suited 
his passing emotions, but at all times denoting a natural 
propensity to humor ; who spent most of his time hanging 
around the corridors of the City Hall and the Court House 
(he held a sinecure) and who had a knack of " getting on " 
to everything that was transpiring — went to the door of the 
room where the " applicants " were waiting for the sleight- 
of-hand admission to the Bar, and, opening it sufficiently to 
get his massive head inside, surveyed the well-known crowd 
for a moment with a look of surprise and amazement, and 
quickly divining the purpose of their seclusion, exclaimed, 
with a grimace which would have made his fortune upon the 
stage, "Oh! be the holy Moses, but there's a power of 
talent there ! " 

On that memorable day, which marks so important an 
.epoch in the history of the Kew York Bar, Mr. Daniel 
Breezy, with thirteen kindred luminaries, became a full- 
fledged lawyer, and came forth, from the deft hands of the 
General Term, with authority to practice law in all the 
Courts of the State of New York. As there is no official 
record of the facts, I cannot vouch for the authenticity of 
the following account of the examination, which was cur- 
rent at the time. But many well-known citizens living to- 
day remember the incident of which I write. 

Knowing that the applicants for admission were waiting 
for the magician's wand to transform them into lawyers. 
Judge Barnard said to one of his. associates on the Bench 
,that he was "going; in to have some fun with the boys." 



JUDGE iBARNARb'S "FUN WITH THE BOYS." IsS 

On behalf of the General Term he conducted the ' ' special " 
examination. With mock gravity he put them through a 
catechism, of which, it is said, the subjoined is a speci- 
men : 

Q. " Senator," (addressing one of them) " do you know 
there is such a thing as the State Constitution ? " 

A. " Yes, sir." 

Q. " If a proposed bill came up for consideration, which 
you knew was in violation of the Constitution, what would 
you do ? " 

A. "I would move to suspend the Constitution ; same as 
we sometimes suspend the Rules of the Senate to pass a 

bill." 

" Stand aside,' ' said the Judge with a smile, " you will 
make a profound lawyer." 

"Now, sir," said the Judge, addressing Mr. Daniel 
Breezy, " if you had a claim for a client of $50,000 against 
the City, what would be the first step you would take to 
recover it ? " 

"I would go and see Bill Tweed," was the sagacious 
answer. 

"You will make your mark as a Corporation lawyer," 
said the J'^.dge, amidst great merriment. 

The examinations of the other applicants were of a char- 
acter somewhat similar to the foregoing. 

But to return to Mr. Breezy. As before stated, this un- 
schooled jurist was unusually effervescent, and solicitous of 
pleasing everybody who happened to come into Alderman 
Sheehan's saloon. One gentleman who strolled in greeted 
him with " How are you, Judge ? " 

" Not yet a while ! " said Mr. Breezy, with a smile. 

It did not take us long to learn that, on that very evening, 
was to be held the Judicial Convention for the nomination 
of District Judge, and that Mr. Breezy was "slated" for 



160 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS, 

the nomination. His friend, anticipating the event, called 
him " Judge." 

Everything was going on pleasantly until there appeared 
on the scene three well-dressed men who, after asking all 
present to join them in "refreshments," took the Alderman 
aside at the further end of the bar. At first they carried 
on their conversation in a low tone, but, as the meeting was 
apparently not harmonious, they gradually raised their 
voices to such a pitch that all other conversation was tem- 
porarily suspended. 

" So you are going to give me and my friends ' the dead 
shake ? ' " said one of the three, who was the chief spokes- 
man of the delegation. 

" The delegates to the Convention will decide it," said 
the Alderman, diplomatically. 

"The delegates?" said the other, in surprise. "Why, 
you are the delegates ! " 

" The delegates are me friends who were elected at the 
Primary," said the Alderman. 

" You had it all your own way at the Primary," remarked 
one of the three, who had not before spoken. 

" Kothing stopped you and your friends from going to 
the Primary and voting for your own delegates," replied 
the Alderman, with a chuckle, under the convulsions of 
which the counter, on which his arm rested, trembled. 

" Oh, that was a fine Primary ! " said the third of the 
group, with a long-drawn emphasis on the "fine." 

" It was as good as any other Primary held in ]^ew 
York," retorted the Alderman, doggedly. 
' " Maybe it was," said the spokesman, who had been en- 
deavoring to control himself for some time, "but we know 
what your Primary was. You printed the only ticket voted 
for, didn't you ? And you made up that ticket in that little 
room there, didn't you ? " pointing to an enclosed space of 
about four feet square. " And you promised to have my 



PRELIMINARIES TO A LOCAL CONVENTION. 161 

name on it, but you didn't," he continued, rapidly. " You 
printed three hundred tickets with eighty delegates on them, 
and you handed each of your own men a handful of them 
to put into the ballot box, which was in charge of Mike 
Hickey, Jim Downs, and Jake Slinskey, — that you 
appointed messenger for Judge Cardozo, — then your gang 
wouldn't let any one near the polls, let alone to vote ; and 
then your inspectors certified that the two hundred and 
fifty votes were cast for your delegates, when you did^n't 
have more than fifty people there ; and then you have the 
face to ask why we didn't go to the Primary and vote ! " 

At this onslaught the Alderman flushed somewhat, and 
after a short pause replied : " It looks as if you have been 
reading a pack of lies published in the papers by cranks who 
find fault with everything that is done under Mr. Tweed, 
when every one knows that William M. Tweed is the 
noblest man that ever lived in any country." 

" "Well, if that's the way you talk," said the spokesman, 
" we, with our friends, will vote for Gonsfager, the Eepub- 
lican candidate for Judge." 

This threat had not the slightest effect on the Alderman, 
or on Mr. Breezy, who within a couple of hours was to 
receive a nomination from the Democratic Judicial Con- 
vention. 

On the pressing invitation of Mr. Breezy, I attended the 
Convention, called for 8 o'clock, in a hall a few blocks away, 
my experiences in which will be briefly related in a subse- 
quent letter. 



LETTEE XV. 

Reconstruction, Impeachment and Amnesty — Desperate 
Attempt of Ambitious Political Leaders to Unseat 
A President — Their Defeat After a Long and Persis- 
tent Struggle — Proclamation Which Made Fourth of 
July a Reunion Jubilee — Democratic National Con- 
vention AT Tambiany Hall — How Horatio Seymour 
Was Nominated for the Presidency — Why We Vote 
for Electors instead of Voting Direct for President 
OR Vice-President — The Advantages of the Electoral 
System. 

My dear Dean : — 

It is not tlie purpose of this work to chronicle the details 
of current history ; nevertheless allusions to salient events 
of the times cannot be avoided if these sketches are to have 
due proportion and perspective. The year 1868 marked 
such an important epoch in our history, and the events 
clustering around the celebration, that year, of the anniver- 
sary of our independence, possess such peculiar interest 
that I know you will pardon me if I indulge in a few re- 
marks of a somewhat historical character. 

The Civil War between the Northern and Southern States 
had terminated in 1865, but up to 1868 that portion of tlie 
Union which had been in a state of rebellion was still under 
martial law. Military governorship and a condition of ter- 
rorism prevailed while the States were being "recon- 
structed." Stripped of misleading verbiage, Reconstruc- 
tion meant political control of the Southern States by the 
dominant Radical party to insure its political ascendancy. 
The point at issue was the negro vote. The Democratic 
party, now that the war was over, desired that all who par- 
ticipated in the rebellion should be immediately and un- 

162 



EXCESSES OF RADICALISM. ife 

conditionally restored to every political franchise, in ac- 
cordance with General Grant's liberal policy toward the 
Confederates at the time of General Robert E, Lee's sur- 
render. The Democracy was especially opposed to extend- 
ing the privilege of the elective franchise to the upwards 
of four million uneducated, ignorant negroes, recently eman- 
cipated ; while the Republicans insisted that the negroes 
should have the right to vote forthwith, and that the more 
conspicuous rebels should stand back awhile. A Presiden- 
tial election was to take place in 1868. If the voice of the 
colored people were suppressed in the Southern States, the 
Democrats would be certain to secure a decided majority 
in every one of them, and perhaps elect the next President 
and the House of Representatives ; for, while the adherents 
of the Democratic party were not a majority of the whole 
people of those States, they were a majority of the white 
votes, and, if none but whites voted, they could sweep every 
State south of the Potomac and Ohio rivers. In this 
conflict of purpose, the Radicals, of course, maintained 
that they were actuated by feelings of humanity to a down- 
trodden race, in desiring to extend to them the right of suff- 
rage ; while the Democrats claimed that the Radicals were 
jLtryingto " steal the livery of Heaven to serve the Devil in." 
Andrew Johnson, who had been elected Vice-President 
in 1864, when Abraham Lincoln was chosen President for 
a second term, and who, at the time of his election, was re- 
cognized as a Union or " Anti-Slavery" Democrat, from a 
Southern State, (Tennessee,) and was then very bitter to- 
ward the South, rather sympathized with the Democratic 
side in this controversy, especially so far as amnesty was 
concerned. He was for conciliation, was anxious for a res- 
toration of the Union, and was opposed to the continuance 
of martial law in the Southern States. Edwin M. Stanton, 
who had been Mr. Lincoln's Secretary of War, and whom, 
after Lincoln's assassination, Mr. Johnson (the " Booth- 



'Sa4 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

made President," as Greeley used to call liim) l,ad invited 
to remain m the Cabinet, was a Eadical of Eadicals Be- 
tween him and the President there was considerable fric- 
tion on the subject of the government of the Southern 
btates, resulting in Stanton's suspension from office bv Mr 
Johnson, and the appointment of Gen. Grant to fill his 
place-the latter, as was generally known, being much 
more liberal in his views regarding the "conquered sec- 
tion of the Union. But the Senate, by a very decided 
vote msisted that Mr. Stanton be relieved from suspension 
by the retirement of General Grant, (who had filled the 
position for several months,) and the General readily 
yielded to the demand. 

About the middle of January, 1868, the magnates of the 
Democratic party, from all parts of the country, assembled 
at Washmgton to discuss the time and place for holding the 
Democratic National Convention; and, perhaps, having an 
eye m the direction of a nomination by the Democrats, or 
because he had just been presented with a large gold medal 
(described as about three inches in diameter and half an 
inch thick) on which were inscribed the words- "With 
courage and fidelity he defended the Constitution, and 
through justice and magnanimity he restored alienateu ' 
t^tates, and while there was some talk and some hope of 
the United States Supreme Court declaring the existing 
" Keconstruction Acts " unconstitutional,the President made 
a second attempt to get rid of Mr. Stanton, as Secretary of 
War, by "removing" him, and appointing Gen. Lorenzo 
Ihomas m his place, claiming that the non-concurrence of 
the Senate m his first order for "suspension" did not pre- 
clude him from making his second order for "removal " 

This action on the part of President Johnson aroused the 
Kadicals to a high pitch of frenzy ; his proceeding was de- 
nounced as a usurpation, a defiance of the Constitution and 
the "beginning of a new rebellion," and while Stanton re- 



EFFORT TO IMPEACH A PRESIDENT. 105 

mained all niglit on guard in his office, determined not to 
yield possession of liis portfolio, the Radical leaders suc- 
ceeded in procuring a writ of arrest, (served upon Gen. 
Thomas the next morning hy the Marshal of the District of 
Columbia,) hy which he was •' restrained from entering 
upon the duties of the position to which he had been ap- 
pointed," and he of course obeyed the order of the Court. 

Then came a demand from the Radical press for the im- 
peachment of the President, and on February 14th the House 
of Representatives, by a vote of one hundred and twenty-six 
ayes to forty-seven nays, resolved—" That Andrew Johnson, 
President of the United States, be impeached of high 
crimes and misdemeanors." A Court of Impeachment, com- 
posed of the U. S. Senate, the Chief Justice of the U. S. 
Supreme Court presiding,was thereupon organized, and after 
a series of hearings, occupying nearly three months, a vote 
upon the impeachment was reached on the 18th day of May, 
resulting in a failure to convict — the necessary two-thirds of 
the members of the Court not having been recorded for con- 
viction, the vote being thirty-five ayes and nineteen nays. 

During this attempt to impeach the President, party 
spirit ran high. It was, indeed, an impending crisis. The 
Radicals, who had a large majority in the Senate — claiming 
forty-two of the fifty -four members, six more votes than the 
required two-thirds — had felt confident of victory ; but, 
when the vote was taken, it was found that seven of the 
less Radical Senators, Messrs. Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes^ 
Henderson, Ross, Trumbull and Yan Winkle (through the 
influence, it was believed, of Chief Justice Chase, the pre- 
siding officer of the Court of Impeachment), voted " not 
guilty," with the Conservative or Democratic members, and 
thus defeated the conspiracy to oust President Johnson and 
put the President of the Senate, an extreme Radical, in his 
place. 

This defeat was followed by threats of bringing forward 



1G6 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

new charges, and of an investigation to ascertain if 
money influences had not been brought into the contest to 
decide the result. This latter charge, usually the resort of 
defeated contestants, was unfounded in this instance ; for 
the character of the seven Senators referred to was above 
suspicion. And as the country exhibited no applause 
over this new threat, the Radicals concluded to abandon 
any further contest with the President, who, standing as 
he believed on solid Constitutional grounds, was still bold 
and defiant as ever, but made no further effort to dislodge 
Mr. Stanton. 

To show you something of the satisfaction which was 
felt, at the time, over the defeat of the attempt to impeach 
the President, I cannot do better than give you a brief ex- 
tract from a leading Democratic paper, published the day 
after the vote was taken : 

No incident in all our previous history ever furnished such convinc- 
ing proof of the wisdom and the efficacy of the sober second-thought of 
the American people, and of their capacity for self-government, as the 
action of the Senate in this impeachment matter. With all that an 
overwhelming majority could effect, with all the powerful coercion 
brutal partisanship and party discipline could command, enough men 
were found in this perilous crisis of our country, to cast behind them 
the base instincts of fear and cowardice, to rise to the height of the 
great occasion which may never again find its parallel, and, obeying the 
dictates of duty and conscience, make a record that will be more 
glorious than ever immortalized a crowned king or a laureled warrior, 
and, when material monuments shall have crumbled into dust, will re- 
main engraven on the tablet of the human heart. 

Such was the political situation in the country at the time 
of which I write. And now, preparations for the Presi- 
dential campaign had begun in earnest. The Republicans 
held their Presidential convention in the month of May, 
and nominated Gen. Ulysses S. Grant as their standard- 
bearer — the delegates from the Southern States in their 
National Convention being a mixture of whites and blacks, 
with the latter in a large majority. As the Democratic 



GRAND REUNION OF NORTH AND SOUTH. 167 

National Committee had selected New York as the city, 
and the new Tammany Hall as the place, for holding the 
Democratic Nominating Convention, the approaching event 
was looked forward to, in the metropolis, as one of great 
interest, because it would be the first occasion, since the 
outbreak of hostilities in 1861, when the representative men 
of the Southern States would meet their Northern brethren 
in a political Convention. 

The day fixed for the holding of the Democratic National 
Convention was the Fourth of July. To the completion of 
the new Wigwam of the Tammany Society, on Fourteenth 
street, every energy was put forth ; and when the morning 
of that day arrived, the hall was ready, handsomely deco- 
rated inside and out ; and one hour previous to the time 
fixed for holding the National Convention, the Tammany 
Society, preceded by its Grand Sachem, Mayor John T. 
Hoffman, marched to take formal possession of the new 
Wigwam, which the Grand Sachem in appropriate speech 
dedicated to the cause of Democracy ; after which Judge 
Albert Cardozo read the Declaration of Independence, and 
all the members joined in singing the hymn " My Country, 
'Tis of Thee." With enthusiastic cheers, the Society ad- 
journed its dedicatory meeting, and the hall was cleared 
and made ready for the delegates of the National Conven- 
tion. 

Additional edat was given to that Fourth of July cele- 
bration, (at least so far as the Democracy was concerned,) 
by the appearance in the morning papers of that day of a 
proclamation from President Johnson, stating that hence- 
forth civil law should be supreme in the Southern States, 
and that a full pardon and amnesty was granted to all who 
had taken up arms against the United States during the 
late Civil War, (except those indicted for treason or other 
felony,) with restoration of all rights of property, except as 
to slaves, and except also as to any property of which any 



168 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

person may have been legally divested under the laws of 
the United States, the object being " to remove all appear- 
ance and presumption of a retaliatory or vindictive policy 
on the part of the Government, which may have been at- 
tended by unnecessary disqualifications, pains, penalties, 
confiscations and disfranchisements, and, on the contrary, 
to promote and procure fraternal reconciliation among the 
whole people, with due submission to the Constitution and 
laws." Under this proclamation, Jefferson Davis, ex-Presi- 
dent of the Southern Confederacy, was really the only man 
who remained unpardoned. 

A fine military pageant was witnessed in the forenoon, 
and, judging from the crovv^ds which visited the city, the 
holiday was universally observed ; while, at night, the in- 
spiriting influence of the day's joy seemed to intensify the 
effect of the pyrotechnical displays which simultaneously 
lighted up the city in every direction. The populace felt 
that the occasion was a grand jubilee — a restoration of 
peace and good will between the Northern and Southern 
States — a new birth of the old Union. 

A word now about the Democratic National Convention. 
Perhaps, no body of men who had assembled since the 
Barons met at Runnymede to frame Magna Charta, or our 
American Patriots at Philadelphia to sign the Declaration, 
ever bore a weightier load of responsibility than did the 
delegates who then assembled in Tammany Hall. They 
felt and believed that the Radical party had trampled upon 
every guarantee of the Constitution, and realized that the 
people were disgusted at their use of the military power of 
the Government in the Southern States for purely partisan 
ends ; and a large majority, if not all, of the delegates to 
the Convention were willing to make any sacrifice of per- 
sonal preferences or partialities, in order to unite upon a 
candidate whose name would best arouse the enthusiasm 
requisite to elect Congressmen, and majorities in the Legis- 



SEYMOUR'S TRYING POSITION. 169 

latures of the several States, and thus secure the opportu- 
nity to form new Constitutions, exterminate despotism, and 
restore municipal independence, so that great Democratic 
centres of commerce, art. science and intelligence, like 
Commissioner-ruled New York City, for example, should 
be allowed to govern themselves. 

Little was done on the first day of the assembling of 
the Convention, except preliminary business. The distin- 
guished men from the Southern States, who attended the 
Convention as delegates, had as much as they could do, at 
the start, to accept tlie cordial hospitalities extended to 
them, and exchange sincere congratulations upon the new 
condition of affairs. It is unnecessary to enter into details 
of the proceedings of the Convention, which extended 
over five days. On the sixth and last day, the twenty-first 
ballot had been had with the following result : Hendricks, 
of Indiana, (U. S. Senator, and elected Vice President, in 
1884, on the ticket with President Grover Cleveland) 132 
votes ; General Hancock, of Pennsylvania, (one of the ablest 
of our Union Generals) 135^ votes ; Andrew Johnson, of 
Tennessee, (then President of the United States) 5 votes ; 
Salmon P. Chase, of Ohio, (then Chief Justice of the 
United States Supreme Court) 5 votes ; "Wm. H, English,^ 
of Indiana, (then Governor of that State) 19 votes ; Gen- 
eral McClellan, of New Jersey, (also a distinguished Union 
General) ^ vote ; and John T. Hoffman, (Mayor of New 
York City) i vote. Hendricks and Hancock had about 
the same number of votes through a number of previous 
ballotings. 

During the call of the roll for the twenty- second ballot, 
William McCook, of Ohio, stated that, after a full and free 
discussion on the part of the delegates from his State, he 
was authorized to withdraw the name of Salmon P. Chase 
as a candidate, and to announce as their unanimous choice — 
and he would, therefore, cast the full vote of the delegation 



170 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

for — Horatio Seymour, of New York. Mr. Seymour's name 
had once before been used in connection with the nomina- 
tion, and the proffered honor had been by him promptly 
declined. But when his name Avas again presented with 
such unanimity from the State of Ohio, it was followed 
by an unmistakable burst of genuine enthusiasm from all 
parts of the vast assemblage ; all business was suspended, 
and, for at least ten minutes, it looked like an impetuous 
stampede in favor of Seymour. Coming forward to the 
rostrum, and signifying by a wave of his hand that he 
desired to be heard, which served to bring the assemblage 
to order, Mr. Seymour, who had been chosen permanent 
chairman of the Convention, said that he desired to extend 
thanks for the flattering demonstration in his behalf which 
he had witnessed, but that he had no terms to express the 
regret he felt that his name should be brought forward a 
second time. " When I said here, a day or two ago, that 
honor forbade my acceptance of the nomination, I meant 
it," said Mr. Seymour ; and he ended his remarks with — 
" God bless you for your kindness ; but your candidate I 
cannot be." 

Something like a sigh of disappointment was heard, and 
a feeling of deep regret seemed to pervade the entire 
assemblage. Then up rose Mr. Vallandingham, of Ohio, 
who, in a short, vigorous, electrical speech, insisted that 
" the gentleman from New York had no right to decline an 
honor which it was so evident those who knew him best 
desired hira to accept," and added that " Ohio insisted upon 
casting the unanimous vote of her delegates for Horatio 
Seymour." 

It then became evident to the delegation from the State 
of New York, who had been dividing their votes among 
several nominees, that it was useless to hope for the nomi- 
nation of Salmon P. Chase (who had in caucus been voted 
their choice, as the most available candidate, and to whom 



MADE A NOMINEE DESPITE HIMSELF. 171 

Seymour himself was committed), and United State Senator 
Kernan, chairman of the New York delegation, addressing 
the chair, said that, " though New York did not wish to 
seem forward in pressing the claims of a gentleman toward 
whom she was so partial, yet, Ohio having led the way, his 
own State was glad to follow, and as the entire delegation 
from New Y'ork were now confident that Mr. Seymour 
could safely and honorably change his previous determina- 
tion to withdraw his name from the candidacy, therefore, 
the State of New York would give him the unanimous vote 
of her delegation." 

This announcement renewed with terrific force the dem- 
onstration which had but a few moments ago subsided, in 
the midst of which Mr. Seymour retired from the chair, 
which was taken by one of the vice-presidents, and it was 
now plainly to be seen that the " coming man" had come. 
Still, Oregon, when called, cast her three votes for Hen- 
dricks ; Pennsylvania adhered to Hancock ; Tennessee 
divided her vote between Johnson, Hendricks and Han- 
cock, with one for Horatio Seymour. Thus through the 
list down to Wisconsin, the States gave their votes princi- 
pally to the candidates of the previous ballot. Wisconsin, 
however, gave her eight votes to Seymour. Kentucky 
then reconsidered her vote, and cast it entire for Seymour, 
as did Massachusetts. State by State, the delegates then 
fell into line, those having already voted recalling their 
ballots and giving them to Seymour. 

In explanation of Mr. Seymour's great personal popu- 
b-irity, I may add, parenthetically, that he was one of the 
ablest, best and purest of American statesmen ; and it was 
truly said of him that " he was master of everything con- 
nected with the history, topography and institutions of the 
State of New York." He had served several terms in the 
State Legislature, was Speaker of the Assembly, and had 
served two terms as Governor of the State (in 1853-'54, and 



172 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

again in 1863-'64), and throughout his career proved him- 
self one of the most conscientious, upright and faithful 
Executives the State had ever had. 

Following the now partly completed roll-call of States, 
Mr. Clark (of Wisconsin), got the floor, and said : " Mr. 
Chairman, I have a proposition to make to this Convention. 
There are in this hall about five thousand people who desire 
also to be heard in making this nomination for President, 
and I think an opportunity should be given them to make 
it by acclamation. They have the same voice on this floor 
that the delegates have, and I move that they ratify the 
nomination by giving three cheers for Horatio Seymour." 

Then ensued a series of " three cheers," which lasted 
fully half an hour, and which the chairman sought to stop 
by calls for music by the band, and by continual pounding 
on the table with his gavel until he broke it into splinters. 
After thirty minutes of " pandemonium run mad," sufiicient 
quiet was restored to permit a revised roll-call of the States, 
followed by the Chairman's announcement of the unani- 
mous nomination of Horatio Seymour as the Democratic 
candidate for President ; when a recess for an hour was 
taken to permit the exuberance of all present to work off. 

When the Convention reassembled, it took but a little 
while to complete its business and place General Francis P. 
Blair, of Missouri, in nomination for the Yice-Presidency. 
On motion of Senator Francis Kernan, of New York (who 
had hoped to felicitate him on his nomination for President), 
a vote of thanks was given to Hon. Salmon P. Chase, Chief 
Justice of the United States Supreme Court, " for the 
justice, impartiality, and integrity witli which he presided 
over the Court of Impeachment." After which the Con- 
vention adjourned sine die. 

This brief glance at the proceedings of a National Con- 
vention will show you something of the steps we, " the 
sovereign rulers," take every four years to nominate a can- 



THE COLLEGE OF ELECTORS. 173 

didate for President, Of course, one of the political parties 
always has to be disappointed in its expectations. Both 
cannot win. In this instance. Seymour, so enthusiastically 
nominated, running as he did against the Commander-in- 
Chief and hero of the Civil War, was defeated. But, 
under our Democratic form of government, the party en- 
countering defeat takes it as a matter of course, quietly 
settles down to business, and the very next day you would 
scarcely realize that such a thing as an election had oc- 
curred. 

Inasmuch as the Electoral vote method of deciding our 
Presidential contests may not be quite understood by 
you, I will add in this letter a few words relating to that 
matter. 

When the canvass of votes for Electors, chosen at a State 
Convention to represent the number of Representatives and 
Senators to which the State is entitled, is made, first by the 
Inspectors of Election, then by the Board of Supervisors of 
each County, acting as a Board of County Canvassers, the 
statement of the result of such canvass is transmitted to the 
State Board of Canvassers, who declare the result of the 
vote on the Electoral ticket in the State. All that then 
remains is for the Electors so chosen to meet at the Capitol 
of the State, and cast their votes, preparatory to the count- 
ing of the same in Congress. Why should there exist such 
apparent circumlocution, you may ask, and would not it be 
better and speedier to vote directly for President and Vice- 
President ? The framers of the Federal Constitution intro- 
duced Electors to prevent demagogues from personally 
itinerating the country, and degrading the Presidential 
office as personal candidates. The people of the several 
States nominate, as I have stated, either by Convention or 
Legislature, as they may prefer, a number of Electors equal 
to their representation at Washington. The framers did 
not anticipate nominations of candidates by what are called 



174 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

National Conventions, or the existence of distinct parties 
in the several States, which would nominate Electors. Thej 
had no right to consider such outgrowth. In order to 
secure to the States their reserved rights, such as local self- 
government by suffrage, and keep their autonomy intact in 
every way, Electoral colleges were ordained. The people 
of the States having nominated these Electors and voted 
for them, the States, on discovering who of those have 
the highest vote, "appoint" them members of the several 
Electoral colleges. Each State has its college, but the 
whole number of colleges are commanded to vote for Presi- 
dent and Yice-President on the same day, to prevent pos- 
sible fraud or bribery, and are supposed to meet in one 
body as one Electoral College. These Electors, thus " ap- 
pointed," vote by ballot for President and Yice-President, 
and that no State may be allowed to monopolize the two 
officers to be elected, they must be from different States. 
The electors are assembled by order of the States, after be- 
ing officially notified by the authorities of the same. Take 
New York for an example. Her thirty-six Electors hold a 
council and vote by ballot for that purpose. The Electors 
are then an independent body. They can choose whomsoever 
they please. The twelfth article of the Constitution gives 
them absolute power of choice. They shall vote by ballot ; 
they shall name in their ballots the j)erson voted for by 
them ; they shall keep a list of all persons voted for, and 
sign the same, and forward a sealed certificate to be opened 
in the Senate, which is the States in council ; and the votes 
shall be simply counted. It was intended that the Elec- 
tors as agents of the States and the people, should rise 
above party and select the fittest man for President and 
Yice-President. But party organizations have deflected 
the intent of Madison, Hamilton and the rest, and made 
Electors agents to register the popular vote of the State, 
instead of grave, intellectual and patriotic statesmen, with 



GUARANTEES OF HOME RULE. 175 

the ultimate power of choice. It was a grand design of 
grand men, the creation of such an Electoral College as 
would choose for each State and all the States a President 
and Yice-President for four years who were best fitted for 
these positions. 

In the year 1824, there were four candidates for the 
Presidency — this was before the holding of ISIational Con- 
ventions. These candidates M'ere John Quincy Adams, 
Andrew Jackson, Wm. IT. Crawford and Henry Clay. The 
Electoral College having failed to give either one a majority, 
the election devolved upon the House of Tiepresent|itives, 
whose choice was limited to the three highest candidates, 
Messrs. Adams, Jackson and Crawford. Then it was that 
Mr. Clay cast all of his influence in favor of Mr. Adams, 
and he was chosen President. This action on the part of 
Mr. Clay, 1 may add, was denounced by his enemies as 
"bargain and corruption/' and John Randolph, of Yirginia, 
stigmatized it as " a coalition of puritan and blackleg ; " 
which provoked a challenge on the part of Mr. Clay, and a 
bloodless duel ensued between him and Randolph. 

Would not the vote direct by the people for President 
and Yice-President work better than an Electoral College? 
you may ask. By no means. Under the present system 
the States have in their own hands the ballot-box. Under 
a direct vote the States as States would soon lose that right, 
and the Federal authorities would control the whole ma- 
chinery of election. Now, each State watches the count; 
then that supervision being removed, the popular interest 
could be so diffused that general frauds would creep in and 
very soon would follow the destruction of the rights of the 
States and absolute Federal centralization. Under the pres- 
ent provision of the Constitution the people of the States 
are sovereign in the election of their local officers. They 
vote directly for their agents at home. "What appears to 
be an indirect vote for the President and Yice-President is 



176 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

a direct one after all ; for the people nominate and ballot 
for Electors who act both for the States and themselves, 
and who now endorse the popular will. A violation of 
such an expressed will would produce revolution. It is 
the Electoral system — although altered from its original 
intent — which binds together the States in a common fra- 
ternal Union, and, in still preserving the integrity of tlie 
States, preserves our institutions. 



LETTEK XYI. 

Bribery Which Was Not Bribery— Investigating Com 
MiTTEES Hard to Convince — Two Peculiar Cases — 
Rumpus Over the. Misinterpretation of a Simple Word 
— More Secrets of Legislation — Practical Illustra- 
tions OF the Use of the Lobby — The '' Contingent '' 
Method of Passing a Bill — An Instance in Which 
Aldermen Were Not "Treated Right." 

My dear Dean : — 

Having spoken, in a previous letter, of charges of alleged 
corruption in the Legislature of this State in connection 
with the Erie Railroad contest, and having also incidentally 
alluded to the members of the " Third House," the lobby- 
ists and their personnel, who thrive and flourish and manage 
to get rich, it may seem odd for me to add that, notwith- 
standing the many charges of corruption against members 
of the Legislature, no committee of investigation has ever 
been able to find such an accusation against a member sus- 
tained. 

The first bribery case that ever came up for threshing in 
our State Legislature was in connection with the Bank of 
America, of this city, the charter for which, it was charged, 
had been obtained by bribery, fraud and corruption. The 
accusations were specific, and the personages accused wero 
Judge William Van Ness, a member of the Assembly, ex- 
Speaker and State Treasurer Jacob R. Van Rensselaer, and 
Elisha Williams, a prominent politician, the last named 
being accused of having received from the bank twenty 
thousand dollars in cash for his " influence." This $20,000 
fee was alleged to have been a compromise of a still larger 
claim for money, and it was stated tnat Williams, who had 

• 177 



178 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

received this money as the representative of the parties 
concerned, had failed to "divide " with his associates, and 
finally had kept one-half of the " boodle " on the pretense 
that there was a fourth party, name not given, who had 
worked as hard to get the bank charter as any of them, and 
whom Williams represented by consent. The accused ones 
at once protested their innocence. Yan Kess, in the As- 
sembly Chamber, denounced the charge ''as an infamous 
lie," and demanded an immediate investigation. His de- 
mand was granted, and an investigation followed with all 
due formality. 

Nobody concerned made the least pretense of conceal- 
ment that Messrs. Williams, Van Ness and Yan Kennselaer 
had used extraordinary exertions in getting the charter of 
the Bank of America through the Legislature. But these 
parties claimed that they had been wholly and solely 
actuated by a desire to advance the public good. The sen- 
sational witness in the case was a Mr. Brower, a lawyer In 
good practice, wlio testified that he had seen Yan Ness 
frequently in Room No. 10 of the old Gregory House, in 
Albany, "'hobnobbing" with the agents of the Bank of 
America. He had also heard Yan Ness, one day, " ask one 
of the bank's agents if a certain prominent man had not 
been seen yet." Brower further testified that Yan Ness 
said that " Williams was a slippery eel, and did not divide 
promptly ; " that Yan Ness had confessed to him that Wil- 
liams had obtained a lot of money from the Bank of America, 
of which he, Yan Ness, was entitled to a share, but that, up 
to date, Williams had not toed the mark, because Williams 
claimed that a Mr. Grosvenor, a prominent politician from 
Columbia County, was entitled to an equal share, and until 
Mr. Grosvenor was satisfied, he would give no money to the 
others ; which pretension, Yan Ness said, was " a put-up 
job, and a blind, to enable Williams to pocket the share 
claimed for Grosvenor. " 



BRIBERY THAT WAS NOT BRIBERY. 179 

The Legislative Coiiiniittee of Inquiry reported that, 
" from tlie evidence heard, in our opinion, there is no proof 
that [ion. Wm, Van l^ess received a cent of money, nor 
have we found anything in his official conduct that requires 
the interposition of the constitutional power of the House." 
So Judge Van Ness retained his position as a member of 
the Assembly ; and as Van Kensselaer and Williams were 
not members of the Legislature, the committee recom- 
mended no action concerning them. 

The next bribery case of any note was mixed up with the 
passage of the Act for the Metropolitan Fire Department, 
and the disbanding of the Volunteer force, in 1865. A 
grave and decorous representative of Queens County, a man 
of character, family and position, named Turner, arose in 
his seat in the legislative chamber at that time, and, speak- 
ing with the utmost solemnity and precision, declared that he 
had been offered live hundred dollars for his favorable vote 
on the bill for introducing steam iire-engines into New 
York City. Instantly, the House w^as in commotion, and a 
demand was made for a Committee of Investigation. The 
old firemen were delighted at this revelation ; the corrupt 
practices of the advocates of the new measure, they argued, 
clearly showed that condign punishment must be inflicted ; 
and, doubtless, in the reaction following these disclosures, 
the paid fire department scheme would come to naught. 

Of course, the case created a stir. Where two men are of 
like character, veracity and respectability, and one of these 
two model men flatly accuses the other of an infamous 
crime, and the other man positively denies the heinous 
charge, there is bound to be curiosity as well as trouble. 
For forty- eight hours, the Turner bribery scandal was the 
absorbing topic in New York City. Every engine-house 
resounded with commendations of Turner's name, while the 
advocates of a paid fire department denied all knowledge 
whatever of the party whom Turner accused of trying to 



180 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

bribe him. It was indeed a mystery. But one that was 
soon explained, with a laugh against Turner. 

Alleged briber and alleged bribee were brought face to 
face before the investigating committee, and then the cat 
leaped out of the bag. The explanation of the mystery 
took place at once. It turned out to be all a mistake on 
Mr. Turner's part, as to the meaning of a word. The gen- 
tleman who, Mr. Turner thought, meant to bribe him, had 
simply told him, as an earnest advocate of the proposed 
new lire system for the City of ^ew York, that he could 
offer Turner five hundred " reasons" for voting in favor of 
it, and Turner, from an Albany legislative standpoint, took 
it for granted that " five hundred reasons " could not mean 
anything else than five hundred dollars ! That was all there 
was in the affair. All the bribery, then, was in Turner's 
imagination, or, rather, in his interpretation of a simple 
English word. 

And now^ another brief reference to some peculiarities of 
legislation may afford you a moment's entertainment. 

There was a gas bill before the Legislature, some years 
ago, which has a history worth repeating. The gas com- 
panies of the metropohs first favored the passing of this bill, 
as, under pretence of a small reduction in the price of gas, 
it cloaked a provision that would work advantageously to the 
several companies in the way of *' monopolizing " the busi- 
ness. Suddenly, it was found that the passing of the bill, 
in even this shape, would interfere seriously with a ' deal " 
which had just then come to the front. So the word was 
passed " to whom it may concern," to " kill " the bill, in- 
stead of passing it. And the lobbyist in charge of the 
matter prepared to " arrange things differently," and undo 
all his fine work in regard to it. 

To the surprise of all save the initiated, the Committee 
on Cities reported the bill to the House, and it was ordered 
to a third reading. This proceeding, however, was only a 



TRICKS OF THE LOBBYISTS. 181 

" blind," made at the suggestion of the lobby manager him- 
self, just to show the gas companies what the Legisla- 
ture could have done if it had wanted to, and to make 
his services more valuable and his men appear more 
deserving of the " boodle " that had been promised ; 
for, the very next day, the lobbyist and his "listed" 
men got to work in earnest, and when the bill came up for 
passage under the order of third reading, it was " knocked 
all to smithereens," receiving an almost unanimous negative 
vote. 

Then, with a rush, immediately after adjournment, 
the gentlemen on the " nay " side stampeded the lobby- 
ist's rooms, at the Kenmore House. They found noth- 
ing ready for them yet; but, on the contrary, more 
work for them to do right off ; for, at the morning session, 
a bill, emanating from an unfriendly source, " regulating 
the price of gas," had been introduced, and the lobbyist 
had been instructed by an attendant agent of the company 
that this bill — a dangerous one to the gas companies — must 
"be put in its little bed," before any "■ influence " could be 
handed over to anybody. 

This making their pay for work " honestly done," con- 
tingent on more work yet to do, was very annoying to the 
legislators; it was really getting two bills killed for the 
price of one ; but, as there was no help for it, the division 
of spoils was put off for a day oi; two, when a motion was 
made and carried to discharge the committee, to which the 
offending bill had been referred, from further consideration 
of it ; then a motion was made to strike out its " enacting 
clause," and the poor little bill was electrocuted so quickly 
that it did not know what struck it. 

Then the lobbyist, assisted by one of his right-hand men, 
paid off the members at the rate of two hundred and fifty 
dollars each, the lobbyist paying some at the Kenmore 
House, and his right-hand man paying the others at the 



183 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Delavan, in order to avoid too suspiciously big a rush at 
either place. But, when the balance of the funds catne to 
be counted up, the lobbyist found that he had paid out two 
thousand dollars more than he had calculated, and was just 
so much short in his estimated commission for himself. By 
some mistake, eight of the names of the members on the 
Kenmore list had been duplicated on the Delavan list. 
And so, after having been paid the $250 at one establish- 
ment, and hearing that their names were listed at the other 
place, the lucky repeaters had, for the joke of the thing, 
gone to the lobbyist's right-hand man and taken another 
little package, saying to each other that, if it was all right 
for the lobbyist to get two bills killed for the price of one, 
it was equally right for them to get two payments instead 
of one. After plaguing the lobbyist for an hour or two, the 
duplicate money M'as returned to him. 

'^ Contingent " bills are a feature of legislation, always 
unpopular with " the business men " in the Legislature. 
By " contingent*' is meant bills in which the contingency 
specified is that of the bill becoming a law — not merely 
passing both Houses, but obtaining the Governor's signa- 
ture, or, if he vetoes the bill, over-riding his veto. One of 
the veteran members of the Senate always refused point- 
blank to have anything to do with contingent bills, and on 
the ground of his health. " You see," he used to say, " I 
can't do myself justice— I can't do my position justice — 
unless I sleep at night. No sound sleep at night, no sound 
thought by day ; and I owe it to myself, my family, my 
position, to use my best thoughts, my full brain power. 
Now, I never can sleep at all when I have the nervousness 
inseparable from a contingent bill on my mind. 1 stay 
awake at night, thinking about its possibilities in the Execu- 
tive Chamber. Tliis sort of thing isn't right. It will kill 
any man, sooner or later. My life is valuable to my coun- 
try. So, boys," he would say to the lobbyists, almost 



"CONTINGENCIES-' IK LEGISLATION. 183. 

pathetically, " if you love me and wish nie to live, don't ask 
me to have anything to do with a contingent bill. Spot 
cash is njy gait. It saves all bother." 

One "contingent bill," of which I have heard, had a 
heavy backing, but the President of the company, feeling 
himself to be '' as smart as they make 'em," determined to 
give his personal attention to it. Having got a friend of 
his to introduce the bill, he invited members to his rooms 
at the Delavan House, and told them he wanted their help, 
and was " willing to do what was right ; " but he was not 
authorized to pay out a single dollar until the bill became a 
law— which was a sure thing. And so he determined to 
play contingency " to the Queen's taste," to use his own 
expression. To carry out his plans, he secured the services 
of three men : a magnetic orator, a iirst-class talker from 
Brooklyn ; an oily gammon chap, a sort of universal flatterer, 
from Rochester ; and an earnest man and a worker, from 
New York city. 

These three promoters soon got to be known to the fre- 
quentersof the lobby, as the '' magnetic " man, the " taffy " 
man, and the " earnest" man ; and they proved to be a very 
strong team. One would fire the energies and hopes of the 
expectants by his eloquent promises. The second of the 
trio would go around tickling everybody's vanity, laughing 
at a member's story, (at which nobody else would laugh be- 
cause it was a decayed "chestnut"); admiring the good 
looks of another member, (who was as ugly as a stone fence) ; 
deftly praising the legislative ability of a man who, probably, 
had no intelligent knowledge about the rules of the House 
beyond a motion to adjourn; while, day and night, in 
season and out of season, the " earnest " man would be toil- 
ing for the success of the pending measure. 

Blood and brains and earnest work of any kind will tell ; 
and so, despite the fact that all the members who had been 
" listed " by the President of the company wanted money 



184 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

down, and that the President resohitely refused to pay any- 
thing until after the bill had become a law, the measure 
got successfully through both branches of the Legislature. 
" You see," said the President of the company to his Board 
of Directors, " that I was right. The bill, as I have man- 
aged, got through the ordeal of both Houses, just as well as 
if we had paid the money down for the votes, and assumed 
all the expenses of the professional lobbyist. It is better 
to have the members in our power than for us to be at their 
mercy. There's nothing, I tell you, like making cash de- 
pend on a contingency." 

But, alas ! the indefatigable President of the company, 
notwithstanding all the satisfaction he had expressed over 
assured success, was knocked out in " the next innings." 
For, in the course of a week, the Governor vetoed the bill ; 
and, in spite of all the eloquence of the " magnetic" man, 
hired on a contingency, and the flattery of the "taify" 
man, hired on a contingency, and the hustling of the 
"earnest" man, also hired on a contingency, and all the 
efforts of the now desperate President of the Company, 
(whose salary, however, did not depend upon a contingency, 
but was paid monthly in cash certainties), a suiScient num- 
ber of votes could not be secured to override the veto ; for 
the jealousy of the professional lobbyists had now got to 
work, and every effort of the contingent trio was silently 
headed ofl", in order to maintain the business reputation of 
the Third House, and show the inefficiency of interlopers. 
As the Senator to whom I have previously alluded re- 
marked, (in reference to the President of the Company and 
his defeated bill) : " He was all wrong, my boy. There is 
nothing like making a contingency depend on cash ! " 

I will conclude these notes of some of the inner secrets 
of legislation at Albany, with a little anecdote in con- 
nection with the " business methods " of New York Alder- 
men. 



ALDERMEN WHO HAD BEEN TREATED BADLY. 185 

A number of years ago, when the Japanese Embassy was 
in l^ew York, a prominent hotel-keeper, for the sake of an 
advertisement, conceived the idea of giving the Embassy a 
big dinner at his liotel, at the city's expense. He saw the 
Aldermen about it, and they thought it a good idea, as they 
would get a generous feed, and they thought it a still better 
idea when the hotel-keeper said he "would treat them 
right," which, of course, the Aldermen believed meant 
" turkey," (as they sometimes called money,) or a " a divvy." 
So the dinner was given, and it was a grand success. "-^ 

The day after the hotel-keeper's bill was paid, the Alder- 
men in the job were invited up to the hotel, and all of them 
went hungry— hungry for "turkey" and thirsty for the 
" divvy." But although they got all the champagne they 
could drink, and lots of nice turkey and other good things, 
they failed to be served with any " turkey " of the sort that 
might be put in their pocketbooks, nor was there a word 
said about the expected " divvy." Then one of the Alder- 
men, who bossed the job, thought it time for an explana- 
tion, and said to the hotel-keeper : " We're somewhat in a 
hurry. Suppose we settle up our little matter now." 

"What matter?" inquired, in a most innocent way, the 
hotel-keeper. 

"Why, that Japanese dinner for which you have got 
paid," replied the Alderman, in his most direct and busi- 
ness way. 

"Well, what of that dinner?" asked the hotel-keeper, 
looking amazed. 

" Ain't you going to treat us right, as you promised ? " 
inquired the Alderman, betraying a little impatience. 

"Why, haven't I treated you right?" replied the hotel- 
keeper; "didn't you eat and drink all you wanted at the 
time the dinner was arranged for, and haven't you eaten 
and drank all you wanted now ? " 



186 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

"Yes, yes, yes," responded the Aldermen; "but what 
about the divvy ? " 

"What is a divvy?" asked the hotel-keeper, with "a 
smile that was child-like and bland," as if in earnest pursuit 
of information. 

Tlie Alderman, in the expressive language of the time, 
" tumbled to himself ; " saw that he had been " dumped ;" 
and the hotel-keeper "had him where his hair was short." 
Of course, he was too smart to ask for money directly ; so, 
without another word, and without their " turkey," he and 
his brother Aldermen left the hotel, while, after their 
departure, the hotel-keeper had lots of fun, telling his 
friends how innocent and ignorant he was concerning the 
meaning of that little word " divvy." 



LETTEK XVII. 

Shaping a State Convention for Popular Success— Politi- 
cal Sagacity Outgenerals Vengeful Jealousy— Demo- 
cracy's Great Triumph in the Empire State— Plotters 
FOR Dissension Sowing Seeds op Discord in the Met- 
ropolis—Wire-Pullers OF the Young Democracy Re- 
volt—Extraordinary Charter Contest in the Legisla- 
ture—Combination Against and Attempted Deposition 
OF Tweed— Complete Rout of His Adversaries— Phil- 
anthropist and Gambler Bargain Over Devilled Crabs. 

My dear Dean : 

It was a very jolly party that boarded the palatial steamer 
" Drew," starting from this city for Albany on the after- 
noon of September 20, 1869, en route for the Democratic 
State Convention to be held at Syracuse. Besides the del- 
egates from New York City— consisting, among others, of 
William M. Tweed, George H. Purser, Samuel J. Tilden, 
Eichard Schell, Samuel S. Cox, George W. McLean, Mag- 
nus Gross, Kichard O' Gorman, Samuel B. Garvin, George 
Law, A. Oakey Hall and Henry W. Genet, not one of 
whom is now living— was the Brooklyn delegation, headed 
by their sagacious leader, Hugh McLaughlin, and at 
least five hundred representative Democrats from both 
cities. On their way up the river, the delegates from the 
two cities (now one, as Brooklyn has been absorbed in 
Greater New York) had a sort of love feast, in which they 
agreed to act as a unit in the State Convention, in the shap- 
ing of a platform, and on all party questions affecting the 
general result of the pending canvass. This was a some- 
what remarkable coalition ; for, at the Convention of the 
preceding year, the delegations from the two cities had been 

187 



188 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

in direct opposition. !Now they had " buried the hatchet," 
and, as a consequence, the State rooms on board the steamer 
" Drew " were not occupied until a very late hour. 

At this Syracuse Convention was openly disclosed the 
evidence of friction between Tilden and Tammany Hall. 
Samuel J. Tilden was chairman of the State Central Com- 
mittee, a position which he had held for several years, and he 
took the liberty, in calling the Convention to order, to de- 
liver a three-quarters of an hour speech, in which he formu- 
lated the platform he expected the Convention to adopt. 
Instead of doing so, however, the Kew York and Brooklyn 
delegates, having anticipated the Tilden programme, united 
in placing on the Committee on Resolutions, delegates who 
had made up their minds not to be dictated to ; and when, in 
the Committee, Mr. Tilden, (who, by courtesy, was made a 
member) submitted an already prepared platform, he was 
astonished to find the Committee disposed to pick it to 
pieces, burn up the planks, and substitute entirely new 
timber. Seymour, although elected a delegate, absented 
himself from the Convention ; and the knowing ones 
claimed that he and Tilden had concocted a scheme to com- 
mit the party in its platform to ultra-Southern Democratic 
policies, for which Northern sentiment was not prepared ; 
and as no Governor was to be elected, if the canvass should 
prove disastrous to the party at the then ensuing election in 
this State, the effect would, at least, prove detrimental to 
and defeat Tammany and Hoffman in their plans for 
the Presidential campaign of 1872. It was the hint received 
in this direction which induced the Tammany delegation, 
(through Tweed's manipulation), to hobnob with their 
Brooklyn associates on their way "up the river," and in 
anticipating and preparing for the intrigue, Tammany Hall 
came out '• 'way a-head." 

During the ballots for the nominations for State officers, 
the spirit in which the Tammany delegation, (having carried 



TAMMANY AND TILDEN. 189 

its point regarding the platform), was resolved to act in the 
Convention, was unmistakably evinced. When New York 
County was called, its then sixty-three votes were divided 
up equally between three candidates, when there were three, 
from the interior of the State, thus avoiding not only all 
appearance of partiality for any particular candidate, but 
showing the desire of Tammany to leave the making of the 
State ticket to the country delegates. When it came to a 
vote between only two candidates, Tweed would announce 
the sixty-three votes of the delegation to be thirty-one for 
each candidate, adding : "One member of the delegation 
declines to vote." This fine hair-splitting caused a laugh 
in the Convention, and a good-natured motion that " the de- 
clining delegate be excused from voting," elicited a round 
of applause. It was a delicate piece of work which Tam- 
many had on hand that day, to circumvent the wily Tilden- 
Seymour programme, but its tactics won the Convention, 
and the wisdom of its course was manifested in the success 
of the canvass which followed. 

For seventeen years prior to 1869, the Democratic party 
had twice elected the Governor and once secured the As- 
sembly ; while the Republicans had frequently held both 
branches of the Legislature and the Governor as well, and 
had been enabled to foist upon the people the most flagrantly 
partisan laws, and had so redistricted and reapportioned the 
State as to fritter away and destroy the Democratic pre- 
ponderance of voters, and enable their own party, though 
largely in the minority, to elect the Legislature, even with 
fortj'-eight thousand Democratic majority against them on 
a popular vote. Thus, through their rotten-borough system 
of representation, giving undue power and influence to the 
rural districts and Republican localities, they stole from the 
city of New York its municipal rights,' robbed its citizens 
of their liberties, tied up their consciences with Puritanical 
strings, and buried local city government under an avalanche 



190 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of costly Commissions, preying upon the people to whom 
they were in no manner responsible, and doing the bidding 
of the Eadical Albany King in overawing and intimidating 
the overwhelming Democratic sentiment of the city. But 
this great wrong, increasing in proportions from year to 
year, finally wrought its own remedy. 

The election in 1869 was a great Democratic triumph. 
It won for the Democracy every department of the State 
government, Executive, Legislative and Judicial; which 
meant that the people were tired of Eepublican misrule, 
and demanded a thorough reformation of public affairs, the 
immediate and absolute repeal of the odious Metropolitan 
Excise Law, and the removal of all attendant elements which 
abridged the liberties of any class of the city's dense pop- 
ulation ; and the people demanded, also, a restoration, 
under a revised charter, of the municipal rights of the met- 
ropolis, the repeal of the Metropolitan Police Act, the ab- 
olition of the Metropolitan Board of Health and of the in- 
efficient Croton Board, as well as a cleansing revolution in 
municipal affairs. 

This was the responsibility devolving upon the Legisla- 
ture of 1S70, which assembled at Albany the first Tuesday 
after the first Monday of that year. The Senate was com- 
posed of seventeen Democrats and fifteen Kepublicans, and 
the Assembly of seventy-one Democrats and fifty-seven Ee- 
publicans ; while a Democrat, John T. Hoffman, occupied 
the Executive Chamber. Upon the Democrats, therefore, 
rested the full responsibility of responding to the wishes of 
the people. 

Tweed went to Albany in 1868, a Senator, but the Dem- 
ocrats were in a minority in that body, and a Republican 
Governor occupied the Executive Chamber. But, as the 
Democrats had control of the Assembly, and as Tweed 
brought with him nearly a unanimous Democratic Assem- 
bly representation from the city, he made William Hitch- 



"YOUNG DEMOCRACY" PL01TINGS. 191 

man Speaker, as I have noted in a previous letter. In 
1868, he carried liis point, in his manipulations through 
his Erie Railway combination, of electing his nominee for 
Governor, JohnT. Hoffman ; and in 1869, through the same 
combination, he had secured two additional Democratic 
Senators from the Southern tier of counties. Hence, he 
was, indeed, master of the situation— the acknowledged 
leader of the Democracy, in fact ; and of this fact Seymour 
and Tilden were now fully convinced, after Tweed's suc- 
cessful manipulation of the State Convention, shaping the 
platform for popular effect, and winning over, through his 
tact and magnetic influence, the representatives from the 
rural counties. 

But Tweed's great success had stirred up jealousies, and 
made more active his enemies. Trouble was breeding in 
the regular Democratic camp in the metropolis, aided by 
the "Mozart Hall" and other factions. 

In arranging the " slate " for local representatives to be 
nominated in 1869. Senators Michael Norton, Thomas J. 
Creamer and Henry W. Genet found much hostility crop- 
ping out, in their respective Senatorial districts, to their re- 
turn to the Senate. Senator Creamer's faith was doubted, 
because, in the Tax Commission bill, he had had passed at 
the legislative session of 1869, he had made a deal for him- 
self ; Genet had formed a coalition with Norton to protect the 
Radical Croton Water Board, the only remnant of patronage 
left to him ; and Norton was suspected, inasmuch as he had al- 
ready announced himself as a candidate for Police Justice, 
and had used his Senatorial position to consummate that pur- 
pose. Such being the condition of affairs, Tweed suggested 
the propriety of ^ nominating other candidates in the places 
of the suspected ones. Accordingly, " on the slate," Ter- 
ence Farley was substituted for Genet; Charles G. Cornell 
for Creamer, and Emanuel B. Hart for Norton. 



m THIHTY |EARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

The three Senators, thus "sent to Coventry" by the 
Grand Mogul, did not gracefully accept the situation. They 
lost no time in bringing influence to bear upon Tweed and 
Sweeney to withdraw their hostility ; and, upon professions 
of good faith on the part of Genet, Creamer and Norton, 
opposition was at once withdrawn, the proposed substitutes 
were gracefully retired, and the three Senators re-elected 
without further bother. But there was one cunning, wily 
politician, George H. Purser, who had formed part of the 
delegation which accompanied Tweed to Albany on the 
steamer Drew, and who had been playing a Mephistophilean 
game to widen the breach between Tweed and Norton, so 
that he might obtain Norton's nomination for himself. He, 
of course, was disappointed in his ambition, and in order to 
get square with Tweed, he resolved, in advance of the 
meeting of the Legislature in January, 1870, to develop 
germs of revolt in the minds of the Senators and Assem- 
blymen, (who owed their election to Tweed and Sweeny), 
against their leaders. He chose Genet for his entering 
wedge, and arranged an "accidental" meeting between 
him and Norton. In the course of their conversation, Genet 
made the then talked-of new City charter the principal 
topic. 

" We'll never get a look at it, or know what it is, my 
boy, until it is brought up to Albany," said Genet, indig- 
nantly, Norton rather dissented from this. " I tell you, 
it's so ; " and, tapping Norton somewhat vigorously on the 
shoulder. Genet asked, "Are you going to stand it? By 
Jove, I'm not." Norton assured Genet that he would not 
be " played for a fool," either ; and the two then shook 
hands, and pledged their words to stand by each other in 
revolt against dictation. 

Then the twain proceeded up town, and, (purely by " ac- 
cident," of course), met Purser, and to him made known 
their resolve — the plot, in short, he himself had originated. 



THE HATCHER OF THE PLOT. 193 

But, as a matter of consistency, appearances had to be 
maintained and his own cloven foot decently covered. 
Therefore, tlie trio adjourned to a restaurant, where they 
discussed the plot, and, " very accidentally," met Lawrence 
D. Kiernan, a bright member of Assembly, and Peter 
Mitchell, a very ambitious young lawyer, also an Assembly- 
man ; and, after a little conference and explanation, by 
Genet, of the course he and Norton had agreed to pursue, 
Kiernan and Mitchell were convinced that the only way to 
prevent themselves from being ridden over rough-shod 
was to stand up and fight for their individuality. Before 
the party separated, Senator Creamer, John Morrissey and 
Sheriff O'Brien " happened " to drop in, and it did not 
take a long discussion to induce them also to join forces 
with Senators Genet and Norton, to " strike for their altars 
and their fires." 

Thus reinforced, the party proceeded to the rooms of the 
Jackson Club, where Purser had arranged to have waiting 
for him nine or ten others, who, being " soreheads " like 
himself, were ready for " treasons, stratagems and spoils." 
Seventeen assembled in secret conclave within an inner 
chamber of the Jackson Club, and resolved to form some 
plan for immediate and secret action. Purser, the hatcher 
of the plot, was made the leader, with instructions to 
" prepare a charter for the City." 

They resolved further, that, to render their revolt a success, 
they would need : first. Money ; second. Patronage ; and, 
third, a Newspaper. It was determined to make no open 
demonstration until the talked-off Ring charter was intro- 
duced in the Legislature. The conspirators then separated, 
under the belief that no eye had seen them in council, 
no ear heard a word of their deliberations. But, soon 
after the secret meeting had dispersed, a tall figure with a 
large slouched hat noiselessly emerged from the building. 



194 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

This mysterious mortal had overheard every word uttered 
at the secret confab. Two hours afterwards, Tweed was as 
familiar with the proceedings and the meditated revolt as 
was his mysterious detective agent. 

Next day, the conspirators worked like Trojans to secure 
the essentials already enumerated, and Purser, operating on 
Tilden— who, he knew was especially " sore " on Tweed cfe 
Co. for outgeneralling him in the State Convention- 
secured, through Man ton Marble, editor of the New York 
World, the co-operation of that newspaper in the proposed 
fight against the Ring. Meanwhile, Tweed and Sweeny 
were minutely informed of every move and device of the 
cabal. The proceedings of every secret meeting held by 
the conspirators were duly reported to them. Consequently, 
when the Legislature opened, Tweed thoroughly compre- 
hended the situation, but, of course, kept his own counsel. 
He went to Albany, and organized the Legislature by 
again making William Hitchman Speaker of the As- 
sembly, and, through Lieutenant Governor Allen C. Beach, 
the presiding officer of the Senate, arranged the standing 
committees of the Senate to suit his purposes. In the mean- 
time, the World newspaper began a series of bitter attacks 
upon the Ring, and the New York Sun, for sensational pur- 
poses, joined in the fray. Senators Genet, Norton and 
Creamer, in order to win Senator Isaiah Blood to the side 
of the conspirators, inspired the Sun to extol him as another 
Dean Richmond, whose inevitable destiny was that of Gov- 
ernor of the State. This had the desired effect, and Senator 
Blood soon fell into the trap. Their strength in the Senate 
was therefore four, and as the Republicans had fifteen mem- 
bers, the junta counted upon assured success, even should 
the other thirteen Democrats in the Senate stand by Tweed 
as representative of the regular organization. They lob- 
bied incessantly, held secret caucuses, and busied themselves 
in manufacturing sensational conjectures for the reporters 



CHARTER FIGHT AT ALBANY. 195 

of their two organs, the Stm and the World. But Tweed, 
somehow, was mysteriously kept informed of every move 

they made. 

On the third day of February, Mr. Frear, a member ot 
Assembly from New York City and chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Cities, introduced a new charter for the city of 
New York. Tliis was the so-called Ring charter, which 
Senator Genet had spoken of to Senator Norton. Its pro- 
visions, drawn up, it was said, by Peter 13. Sweeny and 
two prominent lawyers equally well-posted on municipal 
affairs, were designed to meet the popular demand for 
" home rule.^' It proposed to clothe the Mayor of the City 
with ampler authority than he had theretofore had ; to give 
him the appointment (with the concurrence of the Alder- 
men) of the heads of all executive departments (except 
those of Finance and Law), and making them subject to re- 
moval by the Mayor. The point in view was the restora- 
tion of local self-government to the City, by abolishing the 
so-called metropolitan commissions, substituting in their 
place municipal departments charged with equivalent du- 
ties, and making the officers of these several departments 
responsible to the Mayor. 

The "conspirators" and their organs denounced this 
charter, as designed only to perpetuate Ring ])Ower and 
make of the Mayor of the city a Czar. Then the Democratic 
members outside of the City of New York, looking upon 
the wrangle that had begun as probably of long duration, 
and desiring to set themselves right before their constitu- 
ents as regards Radical Commission government, requested 
that a caucus of the Democrats of both Houses be held, at 
which the following resolution was offered by Assemblyman 
Jacobs, of Brooklyn : 

Resolved, That the representatives of the Democratic party of New 
York, here assembled, pledge themselves to effect such legislation as 
will restore to localities the right of self-government, and secure the 



196 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

abolition of all Commissions imposed upon Democratic communities 
by the Eepublicaa legislation of the past years. 

This well iutentioned resolution precipitated the begin- 
ning of the outbreak of the " conspirators " in the Legisla- 
ture. Senator Norton demanded that the resolution be 
amended, so as to specify, by name, the Board of Supervisors 
of New York City, composed half of Democrats and half 
of Republicans, which he denounced as " the most corrupt 
Board in the metropolis." This was an open declaration of 
"War on Tweed, who was chairman of the Board of Super- 
visors. A heated discussion followed, in which Norton, 
Creamer, Genet, Kiernan and Mitchell showed their hands, 
and the caucus adjourned in an uproar, without deciding 
anything. 

Then followed the introduction of bills and counter- 
bills. Mr. Frear would introduce a bill one day, and the 
next day, or the day after, Mr. Kiernan, mouth-piece of the 
"rebels" in the Assembly, would inti-oduce a bill on the 
same subject, but with entirely different provisions. In 
the meantime. Senator Genet attended to business in the 
Senate, introducing resolution after resolution of a bun- 
combe character, always with the purpose of reflecting on 
Tweed and his associates. But Tweed showed no signs of 
resistance, and permitted the resolutions to be adopted 
without debate ; all of which was heralded to the public by 
the conspirators' organs as " signs of weakness and of the 
certain downfall of Tweed and Co." Senator Creamer also 
took a hand in introducing anti-Ring bills (so-called) and 
all were referred to the Committee on Affairs of Cities. 

The new charter introduced by Mr. Frear remained in 
the Committee of which he was chairman, unacted upon ; 
when notice was given by Mr. Kiernan that he would at a 
future day (and he did) introduce "a Bill for the Govern- 
ment of the City of New York," which, he claimed, would 
be a charter in the interests of the people^ and would 



THE BOSS PLAYS 'POSSUM. IW 



" sound the death-knell of the Ring." The next morning 
the World announced in big head-lines : " The Ring Has 
no Strength Whatever in the State ; it's a Dead-Duck." 
On March 10, a duplicate of the charter introduced by Mr. 
Iviernan in the Assembly wr.s introduced by Senator Norton 
in the body of which h - was a member. 

And so the war was waged until toward the close of the 
month of March, when Kiernan, in the Assembly, had 
managed by appeals to his fellow-members to get enough 
votes to haVe his proposed charter made a special order, and 
after a lengthy discussion it was, on motion of Mr. Kiernan, 
ordered to a third reading. In the meantime, the charter 
introduced by Senator Norton had been referred to the 
Senators from New York City, of whom Genet, Norton 
and Creamer formed a majority of one. This was on 
Friday morning, and both Houses took a recess until Tues- 
day morning. °The " conspirators," or the Young Democ- 
racy members, as they called themselves, asked for the 
adjournment, because they had business on hand for Mon- 
day evening. The Democratic General Committee was to 
have a meeting on that evening, and it was their purpose 
then (having already prevailed upon George W. McLean, 
Street Commissioner, to remove Senator Tweed from the 
position of Deputy Street Commissioner, and believing 
that their success at Albany was now assured) to pass a re- 
solution in Tammany Hall to remove Tweed from the 
chairmanship of the General Committee, and put Senator 
Genet in his place. 

Senator Tweed, although maintaining remarkable com- 
posure during the fight that was going on against him, was 
nevertheless somewhat annoyed at the unexpected support 
some preliminary amendments to the Young Democracy 
charter had received from several Democratic Senators 
hailing from districts outside of the City. His feeling on 
this subject may be best illustrated by an incident that oc- 



108 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

curred on tlie train which carried the legislators to the city 
that Friday afternoon. 

Passing through a parlor car, Senator Tweed observed 
one of his colleagues, a Democrat, engaged at a game of 
whist, and, excusing himself, asked the Senator if he would 
permit some friend to take his hand for a few minutes, as 
lie (Tweed) would very much like to say a word to him. 
Retiring into an adjoining compartment, Mr. Tweed said 
to his Senatorial associate : " I was very sorry, indeed, to 
notice, this morning, that you seemed to favor the mis- 
chievous designs of Genet and Co. against me." 

" I have not decided that I shall favor their charter," re- 
plied the Senator. " The amendments suggested by Mr. Nor- 
ton were to perfect his own bill, and when asked by him to 
help him, I did so out of courtesy ; that is all. New York 
ought to have a good Democratic charter, and Norton's, I 
think, has some good features." 

" I am glad," said Tweed, '•' you are not committed to 
their measure, because, as we all want a new charter, I will 
bring up one next week, which has long been in prepara- 
tion, and one which I believe will meet all objections and 
command the support of all good Democrats and all reason- 
able Republicans." 

" All right," said the out-of-town Senator. " If you 
introduce such a charter as you say, I shall be pleased to 
give it my aid. But are you certain yon can pass your 
charter ? Has not a Republican combination already been 
made, as Genet claims ? " 

" Certain ? " exclaimed Tweed. " Yes, positively cer- 
tain. I will bring up a charter which, as I have said, 
ought to be acceptable to all reasonable Senators, and one 
which will satisfy the people of New York ; and I will 
pass it, if I have to step over hell to do so ! " 

On Monday night, when tlie malcontents gathered at 
Tammany Hall to attend the meeting of the General Com- 



SCHEMES OF "MALCONTENTS." 19$ 

mittee that was to depose Tweed as chairman, they found 
the doors of the Hall closed, and a notice pasted thereon, 
stating that by order of the Sachems of the Tammany 
Society, there would be no meeting in the hall that even- 
ing ; and a large posse of police was on hand to preserve 
order. The Young Democracy leaders were furious at 
this wholly unexpected check, and immediately secured 
Irving Hall, corner of Fifteenth Street and Irving Place, 
where they got rid of their spleen and denounced Tweed 
to their heart's content ; but Tweed, having in the mean- 
time fixed things in New York, had started for Albany to 
attend to matters there, being materially aided in his efforts 
by the disclosures made by one who was familiar with the 
purposes of the malcontents. These purposes were declared 
to be : to take possession of Tammany Hall, unite with 
Mozart Hall, make James O'Brien Mayor, John Fox Sheriff, 
George H. Purser Comptroller, Thomas J. Creamer Coun- 
sel for the Corporation, Henry W. Genet Street Commis- 
sioner, Lawrence D. Kiernan Tax Commissioner, Michael 
Norton Police Commissioner, John Morrissey City Cham- 
berlain, and Peter Mitchell a Judge. This combination 
frightened the people of New York City, and had its effects 
on the Legislature. The appeal of his opponents to unseat 
Tweed was then regarded as an invitation to " jump out of 
the frying pan into the fire." 

The Young Democracy charter came up on the order of 
third reading in the Assembly on the Tuesday following, 
and when reached, was (in the slang of the day) " knocked 
higher than Gilderoy's kite." The " Destroying Angel " 
had been around, as Mr. Kiernan said, and had caused his 
friends to see things in a different light. 

Lawrence D. Kiernan was then a young man of excellent 
education, a forceful orator, and his aims were worthy of 
his attainments. What was popularly known as his " De- 
stroying Angel speech," however, was not a formal speech 



200 THIETY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

at all. The Young Democracy's charter was to come up 
for a third reading in the Assembly at the morning session, 
and all its friends Avere expected to be present to support 
it. Mr. Kiernan's habits were steady as his honor was un- 
assailable, lie retired to rest at his usual hour, the previous 
night, unconscious and unsuspicious of what Tweed and his 
bag of money were doing among the " reformers " of the 
Young Democracy. 

Next morning, confident that there were sufficient votes 
to pass the charter opposed by Tweed, Mr. Kiernan was 
promptly at his post in the Assembly Chamber, arranging 
his notes preparatory to the great battle. Mr. Kiernan's 
seat was not far from the Clerk's desk, and was close to 
Reporter's Row. When the bill was on its third reading 
Mr. Iviernan gazed anxiously around in quest of the elders 
and leaders of his faction, some of whom had been desig- 
nated to urge its passage. The seats of the Young Democ- 
racy were almost deserted. Mr. Kiernan asked that the 
names of the absent members be called. The Clerk com- 
]:)lied (with a leer), but the selected champions of the Young 
Democracy's charter did not respond. 

Protracted reflection was not required to illumine Kier- 
nan's mind as to what had befallen the happy family of the 
preceding day. As he sank to his seat, he said, with a 
faint smile : " It looks as if the Destroying Angel had 
passed over the Houses of Israel last night ! " This com- 
ment sjjread among the alert newspaper men like flame 
among tow; and that evening, and next day, and for a 
long time afterward, Tweed's descent upon the first-born of 
the Young Democracy was alluded to as the visit of the 
Destroying Angel ; and cartoons representing a seraph with 
outstretched wings and with Tweed's physiognomy, por- 
tentously hovering over the Young Democracy's cluster of 
statesmen, lent force and humor to Mr. Kiernan's analogy. 

Thoroughly whipped both in New York and Albany, 



GETTING BACK AT TILDEN, 201 

the combination of Norton & Co. subsided at once, aiid 
made the best terms they could for a bad bargain. There 
was no more opposition ; and the charter which Senator 
Tweed brought to Albany, as he promised, passed the 
Senate with only two votes recorded in the negative ; and 
a nearly similar unanimity marked its passage in the 
Assembly. And the pen with which Governor Hoffman 
approved the new charter, Tweed had suitably mounted, 
framed, and hung in his office, when, nnder the new char- 
ter, he was appointed Commissioner of the Department of 
Public Works — George W. McLean, who had removed 
Tweed from the position of Deputy Street Commissioner, 
to satisfy Tweed's enemies, having been legislated out of 
office by the new charter. 

No victory could have been more complete ; no defeat 
more disastrously decisive. This was the finale of the 
Tilden-Seymonr episode in the Democratic State Conven- 
tion at Syracuse ; and if you will permit me I will add an- 
other paragraph to show the connection of Tilden with 
the plotters. 

When General George B. McClellan had been nominated 
for President and George H. Pendleton f or Yice-President 
in 1864, Manton Marble, editor of the World, walked down 
the aisle of the Convention hall and, in an excited manner, 
exclaimed : " Now we will place Samnel J. Tilden on the 
National Democratic Committee ! " John McKeon, one. 
of New York City's ablest lawyers, and a staunch Demo- 
crat, pointing his finger at Marble, replied : " If you do, 
I will denounce him. I know his record. He is not a 
Democrat. He was one of the traitors who destroyed the 
party in 1848 ; and he shall never be forgiven while I have 
breath to denounce him ! " Mr. Tilden was not placed 
on the National Committee ; and with Belmont, Barlow, 
Purser and Marble, he ever after acted on the " rule or 
ruin policy." With John Van Buren, these gentlemen 



202 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

organized the Manhattan Club, as a silk-stocking opposition 
to Tammany, inside of the Democratic party ; and when 
they saw such men as O'Brien, Creamer, Norton and Genet 
striving to get into power, they determined to use them ag 
stepping-stones, hoping to make of them mere hirelings. 
The leader of the conspirators, Purser, was in daily com- 
munication with Tilden. Purser drew the charter which 
ISTorton introduced in the Senate. Had that charter passed, 
Purser and Tilden would have been masters of the situa- 
tion. But there was no power of cohesion in such a com- 
bination as Marble, Morrissey, O'Brien, Barlow, Belmont, 
l^orton, Tilden, Purser and Genet. It was an unholy al- 
liance, and it met with retribution. "^ 

There was an amusing side to all this political fuss ; and 
that was John Morrissey's interview with Horace Greeley 
just before the collapse of the plot. On the Friday after- 
noon when all hands came down from Albany, (the Young 
Democracy cock-sure of success, for their charter was on 
the order of third reading) John Morrissey met Horace 
Greeley, editor of the Tribune, by appointment, at Del- 
monico's (at that time one of the most distingue cafes in 
the City). At first, Greeley promised to meet him in 
Morrissey's own elegant Twenty-fourth Street gambling- 
house. Gastronomy had attractions for the philosopher in. 
his old age, so he compromised on meeting Morrissey at 
Delmonico's, as the " Coming Man," before he should, an 
hour or two later, on a stomach generously filled, 
introduce Miss Edgarton, the lecturer, as the " Coming 
"Woman," 

The interview was protracted and funny. Morrissey took 
off his hat and stroked his ambrosial curls like the Demo- 
cratic Jove he thought himself to be. He grasped the Chap- 
paqua Sage's hand, called for terrapin soup, while Greeley, 
backsliding from his vegetarianism, ordered devilled crabs. 
As they sipped and munched, they talked. Presently, the 



GREELEY'S FEAST WITH MORRISSEY. 303 

gambler assumed the role of Mepliistopliiles, and gave to 
the editor that of the credulous Faust. The Marguerite 
prize was to be the Governorship. The box of jewels to win 
it was the vote — perhaps of ten repeated — of the Morrissey- 
O'Brien cliques the next Autumn, when they should have 
defeated the Ring charter and got an " honest ' ' election 
law ,by allowing every Ward to elect two inspectors and its 
Alderman to appoint a third. 

Faustus Greeley had long loved the gubernatorial Mar- 
guerite ; he was willing to go to the bad place with the 
gambler, if such sacrifice must be made to win the Govern- 
orship. Said Mephistophiles Morrissey : " Tweed has al- 
ready promised to help Senator Parker, of St. Lawrence 
county, to be Governor, and Parker will vote all right on 
the Tweed charter. Surely, then, it can be no harm to you 
to take our votes next Fall, if you will use the Tribune to 
dragoon the Senatorial Pepublicans into helping us and op- 
posing the Tweed charter." " I will do it," said Greeley, 
tracing fancifully in the debris of a devilled crab the cabal- 
istic word " veto," as if he was already Governor. " On 
Monday last I went against the Tweed charter, and on 
Wednesday I went for it ; so that on Monday next it will 
be in fashion for me to oppose it." "But, d it, Gree- 
ley," retorted Morrissey, "you mustn't go back again on 
Wednesday." "Ha, ha!" laughed Greeley; "but how 
many votes can you turn out next Fall, if I get the nomina- 
tion? "From the First, Second, Third, Fifth, Eighth, 
Twelfth, Fourteenth and Twenty-first Wards, at least 
twenty thousand, which should give you the State if you 
run as well in the interior as you ought to, and if Dana will 
support you beside ; and he will, because we own Dana, 

soul, body and boots." " Dana be d d! " growled the 

philosopher, crunching a crab shell. " Don't trust him ; he 
sold me out in the country the last time I ran for oflice." 
"But then the twenty thousand votes ? '' added Morrissey. 



204 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

" It's a go," said Greeley ; and thej shook hands and 
parted. 

Greeley, to the best of his ability, kept his part of the 
contract, so far as trying to dragoon the Senate Republicans 
was concerned. But, as I have stated, he did not capture 
more than two votes ; while the curious meeting between 
the philanthropist and the gambler " got out " through the 
waiters, and was the talk of the town for some time after- 
wards. 



LETTER XrilL 

Make-up of a Judicial Convention— Its Subservient and 
Crawling Creatures— The Shabby-Genteel "Bum"— 
Vain Efforts at Recognition by a " Had Been '' — Delay 
Which Aroused Apprehensions of a Hitch — Preliminary 
Speech by an Embryo Citizen— Entrance of the ' ' Hon- 
ored Leader" of the District— The Machine Set in 
Motion— How a Judge was Nominated— Acclaim with 
WHICH " THE People's Choice " was Received— Great 
Enthusiasm and a Grand Rush to the Bar. 

My dear Dean : 

Perhaps, one of the greatest arts of a writer is exempli- 
fied in giving a correct description of a political convention. 
But to accurately portray the features of the Convention 
that nominated Mr. Daniel Breezy for Judge, would have 
been a difficult task for Charles Dickens in his palmiest 
days. 

There is scarcely a place on earth where one can see so fully 
the extremes of sycophancy to which human nature will de- 
scend, as one does in a political convention in the City of 
New York. Subservient courtiers, who surround and flatter 
royalty, are trained in the art of paying homage ; their 
obeisances are circumscribed by usage, and their adulation 
is limited within well-defined observances. Hence the dis- 
charge of their functions may be witnessed as quasi-refined 
performances which do not quite grate upon the nerves or 
jar the sensibilities. But if, on such occasions, the fawning 
courtiers were unbridled by rules, and were permitted to 
give full scope to their subserviency, it is not for a moment 
to be doubted that they would readily attest their homage 
by, at the very least, kissing the feet of their royal master 

305 



206 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

or mistress, wliicli, of course, might be very embarrassing 
and confusing to the royal personage. 

Even the servile crouching of Turk or Chinaman in 
presence of Grand Yizier or Mandarin is intelligible and 
excusable because of his birth, heritage and training. No 
such excuse can be made for the cringing abasement of 
American freemen to a political Boss. 

I blush to record the fact that the Convention which I 
attended (and the same may be said of every political Con- 
vention in this city, even at the present day,) was composed 
of as spineless a lot of creatures as ever prostrated them^ 
selves before a throne, or crouched in the presence of auto^ 
cratic power. Subserviency was shown not only to the 
local leader or Deputy Boss himself, but to the under- 
strappers who were supposed to have his ear. Not able to 
get into the immediate presence of the leader, persona 
well-dressed and apparently prosperous, as well as those 
who were ill-conditioned, fawned upon forbidding-looking 
beings who were supposed to be "close" to the leader, and 
whose intelligence was limited to understanding orders and 
obeying them. 

Lord Macaulay, in picturing the subserviency of the East 
Indians, relates that a native chief, noted as a jester, who 
was charged with being irreverent to Lord Clive, declared 
sarcastically : " I affront him ! I, who never get up in the 
morning without making three low bows to his Lordship's 
Jackass!'' The "heelers" of the local Boss were obse- 
quiously bowed to and courted on all sides, as soon as they 
appeared on the floor of the Convention, and a flutter of 
excitement prevailed from the consciousness that the Boss 
himself was not far off. There were delegations from four 
other localities, as the Judicial district embraced five Wards. 
But as Mr. Breezy hailed from Alderman Sheehan's Ward, 
and as the word had been ffiven out that he should be 



SERVILITY TO LOCAL BOSSES. 207 

nominated, all interest centered in liim and liis inunediato 
leader. 

Several positions connected with the Conrt were at the 
disposal of the Judge to be elected, and the Democratic 
nomination was equivalent to a certificate of election. 
There were one hundred and seventy-seven delegates in 
all, and although many of them had the appearance of 
independent men, yet every one of them was there as an 
automaton, to be set in motion and shifted hither and 
thither at the whim of the local Boss. Freeborn citi- 
zens though they were, with the sacred right of the bal- 
lot, they were there merely to register his will and obey 
his orders— without question. Not only this, but they 
seemed to revel in their subserviency, and to feel joyous 
and even proud of the distinction of being political slaves. 
:N'or was this degradation confined to the ignorant. Men 
of education, men who were members of the learned pro- 
fessions, were in that very body, and vied with the worst 
in sniveling sycophancy. They Imew, as everyone knew, 
that the person who was to be nominated for a seat on the 
Bench was wholly incompetent, in point of education and 
training, to fill the ofiice, not to speak of other disqualifica- 
tions. Yet they were there to obey pliantly the mandates 
of a deputy Boss and stifle their convi«tions and their con- 
science. 

The Convention was not yet called to order. Indeed, in 
its present condition, it lacked order. The hall was crowded , 
for the nomination of a local Judge was an event of great 
importance. Forming an estimate from the size of the 
hall, which was about sixty feet in depth by fifty in width, 
about four hundred persons were present. Eows of benches 
occupied about one-half of the space, the first bench being 
within a few feet of the platform, a crude structure seem- 
ingly erected for the occasion at the further end of the hall. 
Thick volumes of smoke from hundreds of cigars and several 



308 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

pipes rolled and circled about, gradually thinning and spread- 
ing out until the atmosphere assumed the appearance of a 
thick fog, and, as the ventilation was defective, remained 
stationary, dimming the lights and rendering respiration 
heavy and difficult. Yet this stifling condition seemed to 
have no depressing effect upon the spirits of those as- 
sembled. Possibly a large majority of them were " im- 
munes," from long experience, and were impervious to 
its ill-effects. At any rate, they loudly laughed and joked, 
guyed and hustled one another, in the best of good humor. 

It was a mixed gathering in every sense. Well-dressed, 
foppish, young men sat side by side with those in work- 
ing garb ; persons who wore diamonds on their white 
shirt-fronts, or in their gaudy neckties, were cheek-by-jowl 
with those who wore red or blue flannel shirts smeared 
with grease or soiled with the smoke of the furnace ; 
some displaying rings set in diamonds and rubies sat 
close to those of blackened hands, unkempt hair, and faces 
grizzled with beard of several days' growth — all discuss- 
ing the question of the hour, or bantering one another in 
the friendliest manner. Then there was the shabby-genteel 
" bum," once a force in local politics, whose misfortunes or 
bad habits had sunk him lower and lower until he was not only 
overlooked, but avoided, by his former associates, and was 
the dreariest looking character among them. It was melan- 
choly^ to witness his efforts to exact some recognition of his 
former importance, as with a smile and apparent gaiety he 
went among his acquaintances, forcing his attentions, 
which, in almost every instance, were superciliously disre- 
garded. A solemn lesson concerning the vanities and 
mutations of life could be learned that evening from the 
vain efforts of this decayed and decaying victim of the vicis- 
situdes of New York politics. 

The Convention was called for eight o'clock, but it was 
already half an hour after that time, and the leaders had 



HITCn OVER PROSPECTIVE PATRONAGE. 209 

not appeared. "What was the matter ? Was tliere a hitch ? 
Was the " slate " broken ? How could it be ? Every man 
in that hall understood that " Dan " Breezy was to have the 
nomination, by the order of Tweed himself, and, what is 
more, that Tweed had had him admitted to the bar, only a 
short time before, expressly in order to qualify him, accord- 
ing to law, for a Judgeship. Close friends of Breezy were 
naturally becoming anxious, and, grouping themselves in a 
corner of the room, engaged in animated conversation. 

Soon the tall form of Mike Hickey, the chief " bugler," 
as he was called, of Alderman Sheehan, appeared at the 
door, calmly smoking a cigar, his face beaming with con- 
fidence, and, with his usual swagger, approached the group 
who, suspending conversation, anxiously inquired of him 
the cause of the delay. 

•' Everything is all right," said Mike, assuringly. " You 
see, boys, it's just like this: The five leaders is next door 
in Colbert's (a liquor shop). There's a little hitch about the 
places to be give' out by the Judge. Alderman Cooney 
wants the earth for his deestrikt, and Alderman Bill Nix 
wants the sun, moon and stars for his deestrikt. They 
thinks they'll do up Alderman Sheehan, and sneak away 
the places in the Court from him ; they thinks he's dead 
slow, they do ; but you bet your life they can't throw him 
down in this business. Then, what d'ye think ? They takes 
Breezy into the private room and tries to give him the gaff ; 
and they wants him to sign a paper to give Cooney the 
Chief Clerk of the Court, when the Alderman, quick as a 
flash, says, ' Not on your life, Breezy ; I know the law, and 
you das'nt sign no such thing without running up plumb 
agin it.' This brace hit 'em right square, and made 'em 
wilt. Then the Alderman, he again, quick as chain-lightnin,' 
says, lookin' at Breezy and givin' him the wink, ' Youse can 
tell the gentlemen, by verbal words, what you'll give 'em.* 
With that. Breezy then says, siz'.n' up tlie posish, 'I will 



SIO THIRTY YEARS 01* NEW YORK POLITICS. 

do the square thing by youse all ; leave it to me.' But 
Cooney is a hard one, and he says, ' No, I wants to get f er 
my deestrikt the Chief Clerk,' says he, ' and won't give 
that place up, nohow.' It's all right, though," said Mike ; 
'' fer the order is give out, and Breezy can't be side-tracked 
fer nobody or fer nothin. " 

From time immemorial the instinct of congregations 
of human beings, massed together for a dominating purpose, 
has been commented upon by historians as something won- 
derful ; but the intuition of the throng that filled the hall 
that evening was truly marvelous. The reassuring influ- 
ence of Mike Hickey's presence upon the faces of the group 
was quickly discovered by those assembled, and the oppres- 
sive feeling of uncertainty which had begun to manifest 
itself among them a few moments before (for Breezy was 
popular with them) disappeared as if by magic, and once 
more good humor reigned supreme. 

Under such circumstances fun was the order of the day, 
or, rather, of the night. Had there been a band of music, 
the auditors would probably have been content with ap- 
plauding the " Star Spangled Banner," " Yankee Doodle," 
or " Marching through Georgia," as a vent for their 
exuberance. But, as there was no band to entertain 
them, the merriment had to find some other outlet. During 
the bantering and repartee indulged in during the evening, 
the wit and humor of a young man, about twenty years of 
age, of strong build, striking countenance and classic head, 
attracted attention. He was wholly unknown, excepting to 
one or two persons present, who happened to make his ac- 
quaintance as a fellow-guest at a mechanic' s boarding house 
around the corner. Having nothing else to do, he attended 
the Convention. 

James Macrose, the young man referred to, had been at 
the time only six days in the country, having arrived from 
Ireland the previous week. It is well to note this incident 



DEBUT OF AN EMBRYO CITIZEN. ^H 

here, because this young man, who was of good education 
and fluent tongue, became in subsequent years one of the 
most prominent citizens of New York. 

While the Convention was awaiting the presence of the 
leaders, one of Macrose's new found acquaintances called 
upon him for a speech. In a rollicking spirit the whole as- 
semblage chorused the demand. The young man at first 
refused, but at further urgency smiled, then looked serious, 
which, being observed by the audience, made them press 
their calls all the more. At length he arose with the in- 
tention of saying a few words where he stood, but the audi- 
ence cried ''Platform," "Platform," while two or three 
of those near him pulled him out of his seat and marched 
him to the platform. Macrose, who was a college debater 
in the land of his birth, divined the character of his audi- 
tors and knew what they wanted. When silence was ob- 
tained, he began : 

' ' I cannot call you fellow citizens, because the ship that 
brought me from Ireland was delayed on the way, and only 
arrived here last Thursday. You see, therefore, that, with- 
out any fault of mine, but owing entirely to the elements, 
I am not here long enough to have been made a citizen. I 
am told that, were it not for the storm which so unfor- 
tunately delayed us, I could have been here two weeks ago, 
and that, by being ' properly introduced,' I could have been 
a citizen several days ago." 

This being a sly reference to the naturalization frauds 
which were then charged in the public press against the 
Democracy of the City, the audience howled, and amidst 
laughter and excitement one man, vrith a stentorian 
voice, exclaimed: "You bet, he's no fool;" while Mike 
Hickey, who was known to be skilled in the art of pro- 
ducing " ready-made citizens,' ' scowled and glared at the 
young speaker, Macrose, seeing his audience divided on 
this subject, and interpreting the ugly glances of Mike 



'212 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Hickey, readily changed his tactics, and, when he could get 
a hearing, proceeded : " I hope you will excuse my ignor- 
ance, because, as I told you, I am only a few days in the 
country ; in fact," said he, with an innocent air, " my straw 
mattress is still floating around Castle Garden." 

This allusion to the custom then prevalent of steerage 
passengers having to provide this article of comfort in 
crossing the ocean, and pitching it overboard when they 
arrived in New York harbor, took the meeting by storm 
and provoked uproarious laughter. Having his audience 
now in full control, and knowing the line it relished, he 
continued : 

" My experiences in this country are, as a matter of 
course, very limited, but perhaps you would like to hear 
them ? " (A voice : " Go on, you're all right ! " Applause). 
" Well," proceeded Macrose, " when I landed at Castle 
Garden, with my fellow passengers, of the steerage per- 
suasion, I was struck at once with the friendship and hos- 
pitality of the people. They were so glad to see us, and 
so much afraid we might go back home again, that they 
put us in a pen, and j)ut a rope in front of us to prevent 
our escape. (Laughter.) On the advice of a confidential 
friend, whom I never saw or heard of before, I went to a 
boarding-house on South street. We were ushered into 
what was called the parlor, in which was something origi- 
nally designed as a piano, on which stood a lamp that had 
evidently smoked itself to death. (Loud laughter.) There 
were, by actual count, three chairs in the room, and a rock- 
ing-chair whose pitiful moans, when in action, suggested 
an old pump which had run dry. (Great laughter and 
cheers.) Curtains adorned the windows, which had never 
been defiled by a contact with soap and water. (Laughter.) 
The covering on the floor would cause a decent rag carpet 
to blush. (Laughter.) The clock, poor thing, was without 
hands. (Laughter again.) While I was contemplating this 



FUN FOR THE DELEGATES. 



213 



array of splendor, a female voice asked ,ao if I desired to 
,,c shown n,y roon,. Friends, I tcU yon, n. confidence I 
«-as afraid to see it. (Laughter.) Accompanynig the ady 
to the top floor, she pointed to a room and sa.d withont the 
lightest Viver in her voice. 'This is yonrs I almost 
feel hysterical ^vhen I attempt to describe that i;oon. To 
begin with, the furniture consisted of a bed, whicn looked 
as if a deep breath would set it in convuls.ons (Uproanous 
laughter a,Kl applause), two chairs that had comedown 
from the Middle Ages, a table with three casters, but four 
egs, one leg having an old book stuffed under ,t to steady 
its nerves." (Laughter.) Then Macrose, m a senu-conh- 
dential tone, said, " A very young cmnb was on the bnrean ; 
it had only four teeth. (Loud and long laughter.) ihe 
^indt :hades were fe-ious-looking affairs of Per.a„ 
variety-they would neither go up nor down. On the cor- 
ner of the mantelpiece was a bottle in wh.eh nestled a 
fltion of a caudle about two inches long I could not 
,::^erstand such extravagance. (Langhter.) A few mottoes 
wxre hung here and there on the wall, such as Be Con- 
tent' 'Hon.e, Sweet Home,' 'Pay as Yon Go,' ' God >s 

Our Only Trust.' " , , , , i 

Before the langhter which this sally evoked had sub- 
sided, and while Macrose was only yet warmmg to h,s 
subiect, a thunderous peal of applause was heard at the 
ent ance, heralding the presence of the leaders, who were 
en ering to start the Convention. This of course cut shor 
Macros!, in his maiden speech in New York, and he ret.red 
amid enthusiastic applause. 

The attention of the audience was at once directed to 
Alderman Sheehan, who walked up the aisle aeeonipani^Bd 
by Alderman Kix and Mike Hickey, and followed by about 
a dozen prominent -hangers-on." Having reached the 
platform vacated by Macrose, Alderman Sheehan, ^vdio was 



314 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

greeted with tumultuous cheering, rapped on a table with 
the handle of his umbrella, and said : 

" Gentlemen of the Convention, I am sorry to have de- 
layed youse, but certain matters of importance to youse all 
had to be arranged. (Applause.) There are some men in 
this world who wants everything; (Sensation) but youse 
all know me, and I don't give way to no man— when I am 
right ! (Loud applause.) Thankin;^ every one of youse for 
your kind attention, I now nominate the Honorable Joseph 
Henderson, your old-time Assemblyman, as the Chairman 
of this Convention, and all in favor of this will say 'Aye.' " 
It was carried with loud acclaim, during which Mr. Hen- 
derson was conducted to the platform. 

Mr. Henderson was a practical man and made a fairly 
good Chairman. The election of two Secretaries, each of 
whom held a sinecure position under the city government, 
followed, and these took seats at a table on the platform, 
assumed a business-like air, taking up their pens, plunging 
them violently into the inkstand, and drawing towards 
them sheets of paper, which were ostentatiously spread 
over the table, began to write with great vigor and earn- 
estness. This demonstration was intended to serve the 
double purpose of making a profound impression as to the 
momentous character of the business on hand, and to con- 
vince those assembled, that, at least, the office of Secretary 
of a Convention was no sinecure. 

The machinery now began to work with great rapidity. 
As each district was called, its representative handed up a 
list of " duly elected " delegates to the Convention, which 
the Chairman promptly turned over to one of the Secreta- 
ries, who pretended to carefully scan its contents, as if to 
guard against any " irregularity." Then the same Secre- 
tary stood up, and, in great haste, read the names of dele- 
gates from each ward who, (or somebody for them) answered 
as being present. Before the Secretary had time to finish 



GUMPLER GETS THE FLOOR. 215 

the reading of the last name, the Chairman was on his feet 

and said : 

" All the delegates being present, what is the further 

wish of this Convention ? " 

" Mr. Chairman," promptly said Mr. William Gumpler, 
a local lawyer, rising to his feet, " I move that this Con- 
vention proceed to nominate a candidate for Justice of the 
— - Judicial District." 

He had hardly finished before the Chairman said, his 
words running rapidly, regardless of pause or punctuation : 
" It is regularly moved and seconded that we proceed to 
nominate a Judge— are you ready for question— all favor 
of resolution say aye, contra no— carried— Mr. Gumpler 
has the floor." 

Of course, it should be understood that this rapidity of 
action by the Chairman was not the result of impulse, but 
of a cut-and-dried programme, and before he announced 
Mr. Gumpler's name that gentleman was already on his 
feet. Gumpler, who was a favorite practitioner in the local 
Courts, knew that other lawyers present were anxious for 
the "distinction" of nominating Breezy, and he was too 
well-trained to give any of them a chance. But the delay 
caused by the differences of the leaders over the patronage 
of the Court now necessitated quick work, to make up for 
lost time, thus greatly embarrassing Gumpler, who had pre- 
pared a speech of considerable length, and who was now in- 
structed by his leader to speak for only five minutes. 
Even a veteran orator might be depressed and upset under 
such circumstances. In Gumpler's prepared speech were 
sentences, any one oE which would have occupied the 
five minutes allotted to him under this arbitrary order. 
His leader, not being an orator himself, supposed, in his 
ignorance, that it was much easier to make a short speech 
than a long one. No man who ever laboriously prepared a 
speech can withhold his heart-felt sympathy for Gumpler. 



210 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

But Gumpler was " in for it," and he had to go through 
with it. Usually self-composed, he, on this occasion, began 
with marked trepidation : 

" Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Convention," he 
said, without a break, for this part was easy enough, " I rise 
to nominate a man for the supreme office of Judge, a man 
who is known to you all, a man of the people, a man who 
knows you for better or for worse." (Agitation among tlie 
audience.) Gumpler, having been married only two days be- 
fore, in his confusion was dragging himself into the marriage 
ritual, and continued : " In sickness or in health, he knows 
you all, until death do us part ! ("Vociferous applause.) 
A man," he went on, " who is a man ; a man who was none 
otherwise than a man ; a man who is with the people first, 
last, and all the time ; a man who knows your wants, and, 
knowing, dare maintain them ; (A mix-up of his written 
speech) ; a man who never was, is, nor ever can be any man, 
except a man of the people (Cheers) ; a man who never put 
on airs by graduating from Columbia College, like his 
opponent, Gonsfager (Groans for Gonsfager) ; a man who 
knows how to distribute justice at a glance, the same as the 
Honorable William M. Tweed distributed $50,000 among 
the poor (Applause which shook the building) ; a man who 
can judge of right or wrong from his knowledge of his 
neighbors, including women and children ; a man " 

At this point the sagacious Chairman quickly arose and 
said, sternly : " Mr. Daniel Breezy, having been duly nomi- 
nated for Judge of the th District Court, the delegates 

will vote ' Aye ' or ' No ' as their names are called." 

Whereupon Mike Hickey, at a hasty suggestion from the 
Alderman, rose and said : " Mr. Chairman, I moves that his 
nomination, on account of his great popularity 'mongst the 
people, be made by acclamation." The Chairman put the 
question, and Breezy was nominated amidst the wildest 
enthusiasm. Then the Chairman appointed a Committee 




Had I twenty lives to expend, this nioment is the proudest 
Jiour of my life," said Dan Brp:ezy, in accepting the 
nomination for District Court Jud2:e. 



BREEZY'S "PROUDEST MOMENT." 217 

of Three, of which Mike Hickey was the head, to find Mr. 
Breezy and bring hini before the Convention. Expectation 
was on tip-toe, for the truth is " Dan " Breezy was the idol 
of those assembled. Breezy was not far away, and in less 
time than it takes to write it, the Committee appeared with 
him at the door. When the audience saw Breezy, it is no 
exaggeration to say that the greeting sounded as if pande- 
monium had been let loose. The whole audience sprang 
erect. Hats were flung in the air. Men yelled until the 
chords in their necks swelled and threatened apoplexy. 
Their mouths were wide open ; their eyes dilated ; their 
whole demeanor so wild and uncontrollable that, under 
ordinary circumstances, it would have stamped them as 
lunatics. And it was amidst such an ovation that Mr. 
Daniel Breezy faced his audience from the platform. 

" Fellow citizens," said Mr. Breezy, with a melting pathos 
in his voice, " had I twenty lives to expend, this moment is 
the proudest hour of my life ! (Applause and cries of ' Bully 
for you.') I was brought up amongst you all, the men, women 
and children of this district. I know their hearts and their 
minds, and when you come before me, as Judge, I will be 
able, from what I know of you, to decide who is telling the 
truth and who is telling false. (Applause and cries of 
' That's so.') This is the only way a man can give out 
justice on the square, and I assure you to-night that, if I 
didn't know I had this quality, I never would be a candidate 
for the high office of Judge. (Cries of ' Good for you, we 
know it.') Has my Kepublican opponent, Isodore Gons- 
f agar, any record like this ? {' Never, on your life ! ' shouted 
a man at the end of the hall, which sally elicited great 
cheering.) 

" Now, fellow citizens," continued Mr. Breezy, " I would 
like to discuss the National and State issues in this cam- 
paign, which I call upon you all to vote for ; but the hour 
is too late and, without further delay, I want to come down 



218 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

to the local issue, wliieli his name is Gonsfager. (A voice, 
'That's what we want.') Who is this Gonsfager?" asked 
Mr. Breezy, with stern countenance and heavy emphasis. 
" Who is he ? I ask again. I will tell you. He is one of 
the dandy graduates of Columbia College Law School. 
(Sensation, and deep groans for Gonsfager.) Does he 
know the people over which he asks to preside ? Do the 
people know him from a side of sole-leather ? (Loud cheer- 
ing.) How, then, can he give justice between you ? (Cries 
of ' You're the man to do it.') 

"Now, fellow citizens," he concluded, "the hour is late 
and your waiting was long. Colbert's doors are wide open, 
and I want you to drink my health, one and all ! " 

This timely peroration was manifestly regarded as the most 
acceptable part of his speech, for, with one impulse, the 
entire throng suddenly sprang from their seats, and, jumping 
and tumbling over the benches, made a grand rush for 
Colbert's liquor store. 



LETTER XIX. 

"Tweed and His Generals "-Last Effort of a Persistent 
Place-hunter To "Taffy" the Boss-Scheme To En- 
able Political Aspirants To Get Near the Head Cen- 
tre-Proposed Statue to Tweed-Why It Was Not 
Erected-When Peter B. Sweeny Thought His Friend 
Tweed Had Gone Crazy -Lark of Oriental Club Men- 
Boss's "Private Business " Door at The Delay an House. 

My dear Dean: 

When Boss Tweed was at tlie zenith of his glory, during 
the year 1870, it was the aim of all would-be baskers in his 
radiance to resort to every conceivable effort and device to 
win his favor. No one ever tried harder to accomplish that 
object than did a well-known place-hunter named Frank 
Duffy, who had long striven to get his name on the city 
pay-roll, but who, in spite of his best efforts, managed to 
niiss his aim every time. 

His attention having been attracted to two engravings, 
then much displayed in shop windows, entitled '' Napoleon 
and his Generals" and "Grant and his Generals," an idea 
struck Duffy, which seemed to him a certain winner; and 
that was to get out a picture of " Tweed and his Generals," 
embracing portraits of all prominent city officials and local 
political leaders, to be clustered around the Boss, whose 
portrait was to occupy the centre. Of course, those who 
wished to cluster nearest to the Head Centre would have 
to pay extra for the position, the same as one had to pay 
extra for choice seats at the theatre. Frank Duffy thought 
he would greatly please Tweed in this enterprise, besides 
raking in from five to ten dollars per head from those 
aspirants for fame who desired to be honored as Generals 

219 



§26 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of the Boss. After a good deal of hard work, Duffy got 
the picture published, and gathered in some shekels to 
recompense him for his effort ; but it was a dead failure in 
the line of procuring him recognition from Tweed ; for the 
appearance of the picture provoked ridicule from the Re- 
publican press, and the Boss gave poor Duffy " cold shoul- 
der " instead of the expected " taffy on toast." Again had 
he missed his aim. '' Just my luck ! " was his favorite ex- 
pression. 

Frank Duffy was a picturesque character of the period. 
He always wore a large slouched hat, after the style of 
"■ Buffalo Bill," his moustache was waxed at the ends a la 
Napoleon, and he strutted around, with the air of a Monte 
Cristo, often without half a dollar in his pocket. He used 
to boast that he had belonged to "Big Six" when Tweed 
was foreman of that engine company, and had participated 
in the parade in Washington at President Buchanan's 
inauguration, when Tweed was there in command. He 
also claimed that he was the originator of the "Tiger" 
emblem of Tammany Hall, having first suggested it as a 
decoration of the badges worn by Tammany delegates at 
the State Convention which first nominated John T. Hoff- 
man for Governor in 1866, taking the idea from the oil 
painting with wliich the box of " Big Six " was ornamented. 

There was some " unwritten history " connected with 
Duffy which Tweed did not like ; for he never took a fancy 
to Frank. Duffy, tired of looking for a place, finally got 
to keeping a tavern at Bay Ridge, Long Island, where, one 
night, several roughs made a raid upon his household goods 
and money till, and in self-defence, as Duffy contended, he 
shot at and killed one of the gang. He was thereupon 
arrested and indicted for manslaughter ; but, before his 
trial came on, death ended his career of disappointment. 

Just about the time that Duffy's Tweed picture was being 
discussed, the proposition of a statute to Tweed came to the 



"TWEED AND HIS GENERALS." 221 

front, and got to be talked of as a bona fide serious matter ; 
yet the whole thing was a " sell," and originated one night 
at the Oriental Club, (an off-shoot of the famous Blossom 
Club) where there was gathered a lot of choice spirits, 
lovers of fun, with plenty of spare time on their hands. 
They were smoking, drinking and chatting about Duffy's 
contemplated picture of " Tweed and his Generals," and 
"Joe " Tooker, (otherwise known as '' Commodore," because, 
for a season or two, he had run a line of steamboats between 
Long Branch and this city) was urging Eugene Durnin, a 
well-known politician, to have his photograph taken, so that 
he might find a place among the " Generals," when Durnin 
suggested in a half-joking way, that the Boss ought to have 
something better than a picture to hand him down to pos- 
terity, something more durable and palpable — a monument, 
at least. Later in the evening, over a game of poker, 
" Commodore " Tooker and his table companions got think- 
ing about Durnin's suggestion of a Tweed monument, and 
it occurred to them that it would be " a good joke " to pre- 
tend to get up, not a monument, but a statue for the Boss, 
more particularly as it would serve as a test of the friend- 
ship of those who so loudly hurrahed for him, and would 
bring out the personal characteristics of many of them. So, 
it was determined, then and there, to set about the matter 
at once, " j)lay the joke for all it was worth," and see what 
would come of it. > 

The first thing, of course, was to see and sound Tweed 
upon the matter, and induce him to give his countenance to 
the scheme. So Tooker and a strong personal friend of 
the Boss, Michael J. Shandley, the next day waited upon 
Tweed, (who occupied ofiices over the Broadway Bank, on 
the corner of Park Place), and gave him an inkling of the 
project. Tweed took the matter coolly and calmly. He 
didn't care a fig about the statue ; still, if out of the propo- 
sition a statue should happen to come, he had no objection ; 



323 THIKTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and if it did not come to anything, be would not care. He 
saw the point, however, where the fun and the human 
nature would come in, and what developments might arise, 
when certain political magnates (pretending to be warm 
personal friends) were asked to exhibit their true inward- 
ness toward him by their subscriptions to tlie statue fund ; 
and so the Boss, with a chuckle, promised his two friends 
to sustain them in their scheme, by pretending to take the 
statue project very seriously, as a personal compliment to 
liimself. 

The Tweed statue idea soon assumed tangible shape, be- 
came buzzed around among the clubs, and proved a decided 
bore to all politicians ; for, just then, a good many of them 
were " on the fence,'' — not daring to offend the Boss, and 
yet not caring to endorse him publicly. 

It was soon noticed that the rank and file of the Democ- 
racy were a good deal more enthusiastic about the Tweed 
statue than were the holders of profitable offices, — the 
rank and file having a good deal less to subscribe or lose. 
All the laboring men (with whom Tweed was a solid favor- 
ite,) who could not give or who were not expected to give 
over a " fiver " at furthest, were outspoken in their en- 
thusiasm for the statue. But the men who would be ex- 
pected to put their names down for a hundred or more 
dollars were at first very cautious in expressing any opinion. 
Finally, a personal canvass and subscription was started ; 
appointees of the statue coterie waited in person on the 
different city ofiicials and members of the Legislature for 
their subscriptions; a proposed site for the statue was 
designated, at the junction of East Broadway and Canal 
street, which was to be called the Tweed Plaza ; a com- 
mittee of prominent citizens, to have charge of the work, 
was appointed, and their names were appended to an ele- 
gantly engraved circular, printed by the American Bank 
Note Company. 



Statue of the boss. 2S3 

The first thing done bj the managers (Tooker, Shandley 
and their confreres) was to get up meetings — bogus meet- 
ings, of course, — in favor of the Tweed statue, at the 
Oriental and Blossom Clubs, incidentally sending word to 
the reporters of the leading papers. The reporters would 
rush up to the place named, only to meet Tooker, who 
would assure them that the meeting was so solemnly secret, 
that, by.no possibility, could any reporter have access to it ; 
but, if they would treat the matter as confidential, he 
would give them " a few points," which he did, and then 
he would wring the reporters' hands at parting, and beg 
them "not to give him away." The reporters would 
assure " Joe," on honor, that they would die at the stake 
rather than breathe a word of the " points " he had given 
them, and then would rush down to their respective ofiices 
and write out all he had told them — and a good deal 
more. 

About three times a week, the managers would meet at 
the Oriental Club, to receive reports from those who were 
endeavoring to get subscriptions, and make a note of what 
Avas said by those who were waited upon, for the especial 
edification of Tweed ; and it is believed that he received 
some surprising revelations, while it was the general re- 
quest of those who did consent to put down amounts, that 
their names " should be kejDt out of the papers." It was 
said that Comptroller Connolly was especially urgent in 
this latter request. Others expressed " the highest admira- 
tion for the personal character and political sentiments of 
Mr. Tweed," but for "family reasons" they did not wish 
to be identified with the scheme, &c. 

"Joe" Tooker called upon ex- Congressman "William R, 
Roberts, and, knowing his pet weakness for making 
speeches, sounded him about delivering an oration at the 
Academy of Music in aid of the statue fund. " Nothing in 
the world would please me more than to be the orator on 



^2i THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

such an occasion for sucli an object. Tweed is a king 
among his peers, a patriot and a statesman, a truly great as 
well as a truly good man," said Roberts, flapping his coat- 
tails and extending his right hand, as if already addressing 
the assembled thousands. " But, unfortunately," he con- 
tinued, letting coat-tails and right hand drop simultaneously, 
" I have just contracted a severe cold which threatens to 
completely destroy my larynx. My physicians strictly for- 
bid me, on any account, to strain my voice ; so I must, with 
unfeigned reluctance, deprive myself of this glorious op- 
portunity to show my appreciation of the one greatest man 
in America to-day, William M. Tweed." 

Roberts (who was looking for a desirable position) came 
near escaping by this plea. But it being subsequently 
hinted to him that the Boss didn't exactly understand " how 
his cold could be so bad," Roberts saw his doctor once 
more, found he was out of danger, and sent word to the 
Boss that he was ready to speak at the mass meeting, if no 
better orator could be had. 

Meanwhile, designs for the statute were publicly solicited 
and sent in. One represented Tweed as a big Indian, with 
war paint and feathers. Another represented him with a 
tiger crouching at his feet ; in his hand a trumpet, on his 
head a fireman's cap, and in the background "Big Six'' 
engine. A third represented Tweed in a Roman toga. The 
Boss did not like this style of " coat " (as he called it) a bit. 
He said it made him look too much as if he was going to 
take a bath. There were several other equally grotesque 
designs. 

Returning to the city after an absence of several weeks, 
Peter B. Sweeny got wild over this statue business — wild 
with secret rage and mortification and astonishment. Not 
knowing the origin of the scheme, he thought Tweed must 
have lost his head ; else he would not want to call public 
attention to himself in that way, and run the risk of bring- 



SWEENY'S PAINFUL DILEMMA. 335 

ing himself and all his friends into ridicnle just for a 
statue, a mere personal vanity! So Sweeny sent for a 
personal friend who had considerable tact and diplomacy in 
his composition. Not wishing to wound Tweed's vanity, 
he thought he would avail himself of this gentleman's 
skill and finesse to try and talk Tweed out of the statue 
notion. This friend, being quite intimate with the Boss, 
concluded that he might be of some service, and undertook 
the mission, to accomplish which he had to go to Albany. 

Upon his arrival at the State capital, he went to Tweed's 
room at the Delavan House, and found the Boss in a good 
humor, looking at a paper or circular. Asking what might 
be the contents of the paper which seemed to put Tweed in 
such good humor, the Boss answered, with a smile, that it 
was a paper showing the amount of subscriptions, up to date, 
to the fund for the erection of a statue in his honor. " And, 
by the way," said Tweed, " I don't see your name on the list, 

my boy." 

The gentleman made some excuse for not havmg yet 
subscribed, and, after a pleasant word or two, slipped in a 
hint about Tweed's " needing no statue " to commemorate 
him, and all that sort of thing. Sweeny's ambassador 
flattered himself that he did this in a very diplomatic way, 
when, to his utter surprise, he found he had " put his foot 
in it" badly. Drawing himself up and looking at his 
visitor with mingled wonder and wrath, the Boss asked 
him to explain what he meant by such innuendoes. 

Then the " mutual friend," beginning to warm up a little 
himself, said to Tweed that, to talk more plainly, he 
thought the statue busines was a great mistake, and ought 
to be dropped at once. 

" I not want a statue ? " thundered Tweed, m pretended 
wrath, "I tell you, sir, I do want a statue. I deserve a 
statue, and the Democratic party, aye, and the people, sir, 
THE PEOPLE think I deserve it. I tell you, sir, I'm going to 



226 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

have a statue, a bang-up, ne-plus-ultra, sine-qua-non statue ! 
A statue that will be to New York what Bunker Hill 
monument is to Boston ! I have done more for the Demo- 
cratic party than Bunker Hill ever began to think of doing." 
And so saying, Tweed stalked off, apparently in something 
like a towering rage. 

All of this acting was done by Tweed to keep up the 
joke started by his friends ; but, as the gentleman knew 
nothing about the joke, and did not see any joke, but 
thought Tweed was going " daft," he returned and told 
Sweeny how mad Tweed was, and how set he was upon 
having the statue. Then Peter B. did two characteristic 
Sweeny things: sent Tweed a letter replete with " taffy" 
and enclosing a check for the statue fund, and determined 
to prepare for speedy departure to Europe at any moment; 
for " Tweed has gone crazy, sure," he told his friend. 

While not alone the parasites of the Ring, but many men 
of wealth and culture, were hypnotized by the blandish- 
ments of Tweed, it is a noteworthy fact that many other 
men, poor in purse and obscure in station, saw through the 
dry rot of the Tweed regime. As an illustration, read this 
rasping letter published in the Su7i at that time : 

Sir : Inclosed you will find nine cents, my contribution towards the 
erection of a statue to Plon. W. M. Tweed. 

I send this for the purpose of showing my appreciation of the man 
who, for the last ten years, has defrauded the public, more especially the 
poor man, out of millions of dollars — so that his image may always 
remain to the public gaze for generations to come. I want to show 
the man who has increased our taxation and deprived the poor man of 
his hard earnings. Then their children may point their fingers and 
say : " It was he who drove my father to destruction by the enormous 
rents we had to pay." Thomas McCue, 

(No. 82 Carmine St.) 
There were hosts of others like Citizen McCue, of Car- 
mine street, who might not be able to theorize fluently 
about the incidence of taxation, but whose perceptions on 
the subject were none the less penetrating and accurate. 



"PRIVATE DOOR" AT THE DELAY AN. 



237 



But Tweed's head was level enough ; and the next Satur- 
day night, at the Blossom Club, he " let the cat out of the 
bag " and owned to a few choice spirits and especial friends, 
how the whole statue " racket" had been, from first to last, 
a sell concocted by "Joe" Tooker and -Mike" Shandley. 
Tweed then sent a letter to the newspapers, declmmg a 
statue or any other public demonstration on the part of his 
friends, and ordered every dollar subscribed and paid in for 
the statue to be returned to the subscribers, an order which 
was fully carried out. But there was a jolly time that 
Saturday night at both the Blossom and Oriental Clubs, 
and, it is needless to say, Sweeny did not find it necessary 
to go to Europe— just then ; while there was gnashing of 
teeth in certain quarters, when it leaked out that the Boss had 
not only been provided with a list of all persons who had 
subscribed to the statue fund, but had been also furnished 
with the reasons given by others for not subscribing to it 
As one of them afterwards expressed himself, " It would 
have cost so d-n little to have put one's name down for 
a thousand dollars." 

As I have spoken of Tweed's rooms at the Delavan 
House, Albany, perhaps I may as well add, incidentally, 
that the Boss, during his occupancy of these apartments, 
had an extra door put in one of the rooms, so that members 
of the Legislature (and especially those of the opposition 
side) with whom he had " private business," could come in 
and out without being seen by " the vulgar crowd." This 
extra door was cut through a partition between two rooms, 
so that a member who wanted to be " seen," in the legisla- 
tive sense of the term, without being seen in the ordinary 
sense of the word, passed into a middle room, and thence 
into a rear room. Leading from this rear room there 
were two doors at each side, with a trusty sentinel outside, 
who, when the coast was clear, would give a signal for exit 
or entrance. This was a good deal like " The Mysteries of 



238 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

irdolpJio "or "The Maze at Hampton Co„rt ;" b„t it meant 
bnsmess," and the members who bad ocea ion to see the 
Boss soon got the key of the labyrinth. 



LETTEK XX. 

Charactehistics of a successful Pf "^^^^^^-?,™^!;"J 

INDISPENSABLE TO PoPULARITY-FaTE OF A MEAN MaN 

Who Sought Public Office-" Business End op a 
Nominating Convention-" Dan " Breezy in a Nest op 
"Strikers "-THE "Bleeding" Process Practically 

ILLUSTRATED-HOW Ca.IPAIGN ClUBS WERE StaRTED-THE 

Big Show Five Men Made-Audacious Cheek op a Tar- 
get-Shooting Striker-An Impecunious Candidate op 
Military FAME, IN A Tight Place-Trouble He Had to 
Save a Table. 

My deak Dean : . ^ ^ n - ^ 

Do not for a moment imagine that I intend, by anything 
I have said in a preceding letter, to convey the idea that 
Alderman Sheehan or men of his type are essentially bad 
Nay, more, I am willing to subscribe to the statement that 
not a few of them have many admirable qualities. Our friend 
Sheehan certainly had. In view of his representative capacity 
his characteristics deserve more tlian a passing mention it 
would not be at all correct to say that he was a man of ed- 
ucation in a scholastic sense. Indeed, his accomphshments, 
in this regard, were bound within a compass which can be 
best understood by describing him as a person who could read 
and write with some difficulty. Yet he was a man of singu- 
lar volubility. His tongue was not eloquent, but his voice 
was loud. His diction was not as grammatical or as graceful 
as that of Addison, but it had a force and when occasion 
required, a ferocity which would have made that English 
statesman tremble. Still, so versatile were his accomplish- 
ments, that when in the presence of his political superior 
he could assume a manner and an aspect of humble sub- 
serviency and attune his voice until it murmured as 



230 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

gently as a zephyr. He was a prodigy of physical 
strength. Considerably shorter than the medium height, 
he seem ed to make up in width what he lacked in stature ; 
or, to describe him in another way, suppose a very tall and 
thin man were shoved down from the top to the Alder- 
man's height, the figure thus created, with all its incidental 
bulgings and protuberances, would present a very fair idea 
of his contour. His lower limbs, short and extremely mus- 
cular, were shown to advantage by tight-fitting trousers, 
whose nethermost parts gracefully widened over a pair of 
enormous feet concealed in patent leather gaiters, which 
were always kept in a high state of embellishment by an 
artist in boot-shining, whose business paraphernalia was 
quartered within the Alderman's liquor store. 

It is a popular notion, founded on long observation, that 
an Alderman, to be a typical Alderman, must possess a great 
stretch of girth in the abdominal region. This outward 
evidence of official dignity was not lacking in the make-up 
of Alderman Sheehan, yet it in no way impaired or by con- 
trast dwarfed the other members of his body. His chest 
was expansive and indicated a perfect breathing apparatus. 
His shoulders were square and of unusual breadth. His 
neck was thick and short. His arms were muscular and de- 
veloped to such an extent that his biceps were plainly dis- 
cernible. Had he lived in Ancient Eome he would have 
been readily accepted as a gladiator. His head, round as a 
bullet, gave strong evidences of a determined will strangely 
combined with kindness and benevolence. He had a strik- 
ing face ; that is to say, you could not pass him without 
being attracted by it. 

He was scrupulously clean-shaven. It was admitted on 
all sides that he had himself shaved by an expert barber at 
least once a day, but it was asserted by those in a position 
to know that, on great occasions, he underwent this opera- 
tion twice a day. However this may be, he always pre- 



PENURIOUSNESS A DETRIMENT TO POPULARITY. 231 

sented a countenance absolutely free from the slightest 
token that any beard had ever dared to grow there. His 
nose was short, straight and aggressive. His cheeks glistened 
with the glow of health. His forehead, tliough not high 
was broad and indicated brain room. His chin was promi- 
nent and, as it w^ere, held its own. He had his mouth 
under perfect control. .It was large, but by no means 
forbidding. The absence of beard gave it full display. 
As a general rule it wore a perpetual smile, while on 
occasions when his anger was aroused, it assumed a firm- 
ness and severity before which many a braggart had quailed 
in fear. 

But it would be idle for him to attempt to maintain his 
local ascendancy in the politics of New York City, without 
exhibiting tendencies toward benevolence and sympathy 
with the distressed, which, it must be admitted, formed a 
dominant trait of his nature. While quickly discerning an 
impostor, whose appeals he summarily disposed of, no gen- 
uine case of distress was ever presented to him in vain. He 
was never known to keep a pocket-book. The money for 
liis current use was kept in his capacious pockets, loose and 
scattered, and when his day's work was over he was wholly 
incapable of telling how much he had expended, or the 
channels into which his various contributions had passed. 

I refer to this subject, because I know that, no matter 
what may be the faults of the political system of which he 
and his kind are the outgrowth, there is no more charitable 
man living on the face of the earth than the New York liquor 
dealer. No man entering politics in subordinate stations 
ever made headway who showed any symptoms of penurious- 
ness. I distinctly recall the fate of a man who was for a short 
time an Alderman and leader in an adjoining district to the 
one under discussion, who was close-fisted and unsympathetic 
with the poor. After an experience of six months in office, 
his constituents, by a natural instinct, detected in him a want 



232 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of liberality which proved fatal to his aspirations in the 
comins: election. Alderman Kissam was a man of consider- 
able means. He was wholly deficient in the bodily qualifi- 
cations which are popularly associated with such a dignitary, 
for he was lank and lean, and, from his appearance, would 
never have been accredited with being a City Father. 
Besides these shortcomings, his. habits were unfortunate 
from a political stand-point. He not only kept a pocket- 
book, but a very small one at that. Indeed it could not 
be properly described as a pocketbook at all, but at 
best as merely a purse, one of those contrivances, 
about three inches square, which opened and shut by means 
of a clasp at the top and contained but one compartment. 
This solitary compartment accommodated one or two bills 
of small denominations, a few pieces of silver, and a larger 
quantity of pennies. 

Whenever A.lderman Kissam gave any pittance in the way 
of charity, which, to speak the truth, was of very rare occur- 
rence, his mode of bestowing it was most unfortunate for 
his reputation. Whether it was a dollar towards providing 
a Christmas dinner for the poor, or a penny to a mendicant, 
the process of extraction from his little purse was the same. 
Having fully determined to make the charitable invest- 
ment, after hearing and considering the appeal — for he was 
never known to act on impulse-r-he drew out the purse, 
slowly and cautiously, turned his back to the supplicant, 
and searched for the dollar or the penny, as the case might 
be ; then, entirely secure from the anxious gaze of the beg- 
gar during his own scrutiny of the purse's contents, he ex- 
tracted from it the sura which his spirit of charity prompted, 
closed the purse, put it back in his pocket, and, with a smile 
of benevolence which Peabody might have envied, delivered 
himself of his weighty contribution. These exhibitions, 
few as they were, were as fatal to his political success 
as if he were suspected to have been the greatest bribetaker 



PUBLICANS AND PHARISEES. 2:33 

that ever infested the Aldernianic Chamber ; and, conse- 
quently, at the ensuing election he was buried beneath an 
avalanche of adverse votes. 

As a rule, the liquor dealer in politics makes headway by 
no false pretenses. He is no better or no worse than he ap- 
pears. He is free from hypocrisy and cant. He is in poli- 
tics as a matter of business, and he makes no disguise of it. 
He laughs to scorn those who sanctimoniously publish to 
the world that they accept political station for the benefit 
of the people, and that the sole object of their existence on 
earth is to see that the taxpayer is protected and the citizen 
upheld in all his inalienable rights. Such declarations he 
regards (and justly in most cases) as the merest sham. He 
is open, frank, free of expression, generous and hospitable. 
He never dreams that his methods of conducting local poli- 
tics are otherwise than in harmony with the highest princi- 
ples of political science, adhered to because of precedent, 
and justifiable because of example. 

Not so with the scheming rogues at the top ! Some of 
these have held themselves forth, not only as persons of 
eminent respectability, but even of unctuous piety. They 
have paraded before the public as gentlemen of lofty 
thoughts and unselfish purposes, when in point of fact they 
were the most expert liars on the face of God's earth. 
Their chicanery, their false pretenses, their unscrupulous 
seizure of everything within reach in the way of public 
plunder, their arts and devices to filch money from the pub- 
lic Treasury by direct and indirect methods, and their free- 
dom from the slightest trace of a lost conscience, place 
them in a class of malefactors who, in point of dissimulation 
and deceit, and in minute acquaintance with the meanest as 
well as the most daring sinuosities of political intrigue, have 
hardly a parallel in history. 

But, let me now return to " Dan " Breezy, whom I left, 
m mj last letter, in Colbert's liquor saloon, to which the 



234 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

nominating convention had adjourned with a grand rush, 
upon the invitation of that higldy honored personage. 

After the first round of drinks, which was followed with 
cheer after cheer from his enthusiastic supporters, Breezy 
was surrounded by congratulating hand-shakers, who el- 
bowed each other and crowded around him in a most 
affectionate way. Above the din could be heard an occa- 
sional exclamation from Breezy of : " Thanks," " A sure 
thing,'' " Will see you later " ; " You can bet I'll have a 
walk-over." Then he called out, in a louder tone of 
voice, " Colbert, what are you doing there, old boy ; attend 
to business. My friends will join me in another drink to 
the success of the party." 

After swallowing a second "pony," amid cheers and 
exclamations of " Isn't he a daisy?" from those who could 
not restrain their admiration for him, when his second 
invitation to the bar greeted their ears, Breezy turned to 
Mike Hickey, saying, " In a little while treat the boys 
again, on my account; I've got some private^ business in 
the back room." 

At the rear of Colbert's saloon was a small room, in which 
were a couple of tables and a dozen chairs, which the 
patrons of his establishment would occasionally occupy for 
a game of "-pinochle" or "-forty-five," and thither went 
Breezy, followed by about a dozen individuals who had 
been looking for a chance to button-hole him, while he 
was responding to compliments from " gentlemen of influ- 
ence " from all parts of his district. 

The parties who followed Breezy into the private rooms 
were the " business end " of a nominating convention. 
One wanted to do the printing of his posters ; another to 
get the job of distributing his placards ; another wanted 
him to buy ball tickets for the benefit of a Workingman's 
Association ; still another had tickets for a raffle to aid a 
'' poor widow ; " then there was a reportei- from a local 



ATTENDING TO NOMINATION DETAILS. 235 

paper, svlio wanted to publish his " pedigree," with a por- 
trait, and an order for 5,000 copies ; several representatives 
from target companies, desiring prizes to shoot for; and 
committees from '' flourishing clubs" in his judicial dis- 
trict, which proposed to "swing his banner" from their 
respective headcpiarters ; and, as Breezy attended to ea'ch 
of these in turn, in the artful manner of a wide-awake 
political rounder, still others were pressing the Judge to 
visit their respective district meetings to '' give the boys a 
speech." More than half an hour was occupied in at- 
tending to this business, during which Breezy was seen 
to frequently put his hand in his trousers pocket, and 
haul out Ave dollar bills, receiving in return tickets 
for this, that and another thing, until he heard the voice 
of Mike Hickey, inquiring " if he was going to stay there 
all night r' Breezy then came out, telling those who 
still hung around him in the " reception room," that they 
could see him at his office the next day " down town." 
Then, shouting out : " Boys, step up, and take some- 
thins:," he called for another round, and asked the bar- 
keeper to let him know how much was due him for 
" refreshments " ? That individual proceeded to get the 
desired information from Colbert, and returned with the 
answer " One hundred dollars will be about right. It 
amounts to a heap more, but Colbert, he says, ' be easy on 
the Judge ; I wants to act square with him.' " Breezy 
knew that not more than one hundred of his constituents 
had crowded into the barroom, and at ten cents ahead the 
four '*■ rounds " would not have reached that princely 
sum ; but, at a look from Mike Hickey, he made no ob- 
jection to the amount claimed, but squared the account 
" like a little man." After which, in company with Mike 
Hickey, he took his departure, stopping in on his way home 
to see Alderman Sheehan and talk over the plan of cam- 
paign. 



236 THIRTY YEARS OP NEW YORK POLITICS. 

" Striking " nominees, in the Ring days, was carried to ex- 
tremes. It was, in fact, a systsmatic form of brigandage. 
Those running for office would iiave been glad to ignore it, 
but few regarded it good policy so to do. The operations of 
the strikers were indeed characterized by so much adroitness 
and skill as almost to excite admiration from their victims. 

Of course there were all kinds of " strikers," or, more 
properly speaking, there were strikers who sought to im- 
pose upon candidates for office in all kinds of ways. At an 
exciting Presidential election it was customary to organize 
what were called "campaign clubs" in almost every elec- 
tion district of the city, for the purpose of arousing the 
enthusiasm of the voters in small neighborhoods; and 
often these organizations became permanent institutions. 
The known existence of these clubs afforded the political 
brigands an excellent opportunity to pursue their nefarious 
practices. 

The plan of operations of the campaign club strikers was 
somewhat as follows: A bright fellow, with a glib tongue, 
w^ould enlist four others to co-operate with him in the car- 
rying out of his scheme. They would spend a quarter in 
the purchase of foolscap paper, borrow a copy of the city 
directory, write down the names of two or three hundred 
people as enrolled members of the club, then wait upon a 
saloonkeeper who had suitable accommodations, show him 
the list of names, and convince him that it would be greatly 
to his advantage to have the club meet at his place. Hav- 
ing arranged such preliminaries, then the promoter of the 
scheme would be on the alert for nominating conventions ; 
and, as soon as one was held, he and his associates would 
surround the nominee, picture to him the great importance 
and influence of the members of the club, and advising 
him of its intention to enter heart and soul into the cam- 
paign, read him some resolutions in favor of supporting 
liim, and exact a promise from the nominee to honor the 



TRICKS OF CAMPAIGN CLUB STRIKERS. 237 

club with liis presence the next night, or as soon thereafter 
as possible. 

On the night appointed for the meeting, the five men 
would be on liand "good and early," securing from the saloon- 
keeper a couple of kegs of beer and a dozen glasses, "just 
to quench the thirst of the boys," assuring him of more 
liberal patronage later on ; and then they would run 
around the neighborhood and get together fifty or sixty 
men and boys to participate in free beer, and hear the new 
candidate speak, &c. And when assembled the head-striker 
would keep the crowd good-natured by telling stories 
and anecdotes, while he would assure those present that 
" a good speech " was in store for them when the nominee 
turned up. 

As soon as it was ascertained that the candidate had 
reached the neighborhood, the prime mover would locate two 
of his associates, one on each side of a table, to act as secretary 
and treasurer, make of another a presiding officer, while the 
other was seated in the audience, to act as claqueur, and start 
the " enthusiasm " at a signal to be given by him. Then 
the promoter would begin a political harangue, to kill time, 
and just at the moment when the candidate entered the 
room, he would mention his name, the claqueur would rise and 
propose three cheers for the nominee, always enthusiasti- 
cally given, and this "unparalleled enthusiasm" — as the 
daily newspaper reporter might be induced to call it — would 
greatly flatter the candidate, who, bowing to the right and 
left in acknowledgment of the applause, made his way down 
the centre aisle, at the invitation of the presiding officer, to 
"take a seat on the platform." And then, called upon 
for a speech, he would indulge in the usual buncombe. 
At the close of his remarks, and after the applause with 
which the speech was greeted had subsided, the head-striker 
would address the chair, and say that, in view of the hand- 
some recognition which the nominee had given their " time- 



23g THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

honored club," he would move that, for the purposes of the 
present campaign, its name be changed to that of the 
honorable gentleman they had resolved to support. The 
claqueur would rise to second this motion, but when so 
seconded, the chairman would state that "under the 
rules any change of the by-laws would have to lie on the 
table for a week.''' The head-striker would then express 
his regret at tlie necessary delay, and not press liis motion ; 
bnt the time required to comply with the by-laws was for 
another purpose. 

The candidate would now feel that he ought to give 
some evidence of his appreciation of the honor he had 
received, and of the higher honor proposed to be conferred 
upon him, and invite those present, upon adjournment of 
the meeting, to enjoy the comforts of the saloon below ; 
which invitation would of course be accepted, and the pro- 
moter of the enterprise would then arrange with the saloon- 
keeper that not only the drinks ordered by the nominee, 
but the beer used up before the candidate's appearance, 
should be charged in one lumj) to the nominee. Of course, 
under the circumstances, the candidate would not stop to 
dispute the bill. And so the saloon-keeper and the club 
covered their expenses that night out of the nominee's 
pocket. 

The next day, the head-striker and two of his com- 
panions, in behalf of the club, would call upon the candi- 
date before he had time to cool, and requesting a subscription 
to aid it in putting up " a transparency " with his name on 
it, obtain from him a couple of hundred dollars for cam- 
paign expenses, which sum, when received, would be divided 
between the promoter and his confreres, and that would 
be the last tliat candidate would hear of the club. But, 
there were others. 

It was the custom among almost every branch of skilled 
mechanics, as well as among the members of the fire 



VICTIMIZING A CANDIDATE FOR CONGRESS. 239 

engine companies, to liave a day's outing in October of 
eacli year, when, to add interest to the occasion, they would 
shoot at targets for prizes contributed by the friends of 
the members ; and the better to carry out the semi-military 
appearance of the turn-out, would organize themselves as 
companies, marching to their chosen locality with a band 
of music ; and after the shooting and distribution of prizes 
they would have a regular picnic with their families, and a 
dance to wind up the festivities of the occasion. These 
were enjoyable, and generally well-conducted affairs. 

But, this target-shooting feature, occurring just before 
the annual elections, was also made use of by the striking 
fraternity as a means to " bleed " candidates for office. 

A story is told of an impecunious politician of military 
fame, showing how, when once he was running for Con- 
gress, he was waited upon and victimized by strikers who 
represented themselves as an authorized committee from 
a target-shooting organization in the candidate's district. 

When the bogus committee called upon their intended 
victim and made known their mission, the candidate, who 
had doubtless been overrun with many similar applications, 
pleaded poverty, and vowed that, just then, he did not have 
a five dollai* bill in his pocket. 

" But, perhaps, your wife has some money with her," 
suggested the spokesman of the alleged target-shooters' 
committee, who happened to know that the lady had at 
least the reputation of possessing ample means. " The 
shooting comes off day after to-morrow,'* he added, '"and 
we are hard pressed for time to arrange matters." 

The candidate's first impulse was to knock the impudent 
fellow down, but realizing that he was in a close contest, 
and needed every vote he could get, sober second thought 
advised him to go and see liis wife. While discussing the 
situation, he " arranged " with her that there was only 
twenty dollars in her possession, and received that amount 



240 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

from ner. K-eturning to his visitors, he told this fact to 
the target committee. The spokesman of the party took 
the matter very coolly, however. He was equal to any 
emergency. He did not seem touched in the slightest 
degree by the candidate's pecuniary trouble. 

" Twenty dollars," said he. " Well, General, let us have 
the twenty dollars for the boys, and I will explain how you 
are fixed," and he stretched out his hand for the $20, which 
the candidate unhesitatingly delivered to him. 

" Now, General," said the striker, when he had counted 
the money and put it in his pocket, " this $20 is all good 
enough for beer money for the boys, but you must give us 
something worthy of yourself as a prize— something the 
boys can show — a watch or a diamond ring — something to 
shout for and make them feel they are appreciated, so they 
can work all the harder for you. Don't you think so, 
Jim ? " he continued, addressing one of his associates. 

" Of course ! The boys will expect something real nice 
from the General," responded Jim. 

The candidate, who could hardly restrain his indignation 
at this cool proceeding, had his breath nearly taken away, 
when the spokesman of the party, walking toward a 
valuable mosaic carved table in a corner of the room, 
which was a wedding present to his wife, said : 

"What a splendid committee-room table this would 
make for the boys. We will be satisfied with this table. 
General ; and, to save time and expense, we will take it 
right along with us now. When the boys see that table, 
they will go for you sure, and never forget you." 

" That's so," the man, known as Jim, chimed in ; " tho 
boys will rally 'round you. General, for that table, and no 
mistake." 

" Bet your life on that," exclaimed the third committee 
man, who thought it was now time for him to say 
something. 



HOW HE GOT RID OF THE SCOUNDRELS. 241 

Each of the scoundrels had at a glance gauged the value 
of the table, and was mentally calculating how large a 
ransom the General would i)ay rather than part with it ; for 
that was the scheme of the trio. 

The candidate, while ready to burst with rage, at this 
climax of cheek, could not help admiring the monumental 
impudence and persistency of the gang of would-be 
marauders, though he did not propose to let them despoil 
him of his property. But it cost him, as he afterwards 
freely admitted, about half an hour more of talk, and his 
wife's check for $50 to save the table. 

This incident will give you an idea of the "gall" and 
impudence of some of the strikers who flourished in the 
flush days of the Tweed ring. There are plenty of deceptive 
rogues ready to take advantage of and " bleed " aspirants 
for oflice nowadays, but, like a good many of our present 
day politicians, in comparison with their prototypes of 
thirty years ago, they are mere pigmies. 



LETTER XXI. 

"Dan"' Breezy's Skilful Management of His Whirlwind Can 
YAss — An Acknowledged "Corker" as a Candidate — 
Vindicating His Judicial Dignity to a Torchlight Pro- 
cession — Overpowering Applause Rattles His Pre- 
pared Speech — Mike Hickey Gives the Cue to the 
Judge-Elect — But Even Ten-Cent Whiskey Fails to 
Mitigate His Dismal Oratorical Failure. 

My dear Dean : 

Perhaps no phase of official life in ]^ew York during the 
Tweed ascendancy afforded more amusement than the ad- 
ministration of justice in the lower Courts. By " the lower 
Courts " I mean local tribunals for the trial of civil actions 
where the amount involved in a case did not exceed $250. 
They had also jurisdiction in summary proceedings for 
dispossessing tenants. These Courts must be distinguished 
from Police Justices' (or Magistrates') Courts, the functions 
of which were confined to committing for trial those chai:ged 
with crime, and inflicting punishment on those guilty of 
minor delinquencies. These Magistrates or Police Justices 
were appointed by the Mayor, and there was not then any 
requirement that they should be lawyers. 

With the Judges of the local Civil Courts it was differ- 
ent. They were not only elected by the suffrages of their 
respective districts, but it was necessary that they should be 
members of the Bar. In many instances, those elected were 
mere Ward politicians, whose admission to the noble profes- 
sion of the law was accomplished in the brisk and jovial man- 
ner described in a preceding letter. I do not say that all of 
the districts in New York were so represented, but a large 
majority of them were. This evil, in latter years, has 

242 ' 



BREEZY'S WHIRLWIND CANVASS. 243 

almost wholly disappeared. Nor was the scandal, arising 
from the administration of justice at the hands of such men, 
one hundredth part of that flowing from the conduct of the 
skilled rascals who presided in some of the higher Courts. 
Of course, the moral sense of a lai-ge portion of the com- 
munity was much offended at the spectacle of grossly in- 
competent persons occupying seats on the judicial bench. 
But the mischief was happily confined within narrow 
hounds, and many people were more inclined to be amused 
than shocked at the grotesque ignorance and incapacity of 
some of these judicial dignitaries. 

In a preceding letter, we parted company with Mr. 
Daniel Breezy at the point where, having invited the entire - 
convention to drink his health, on the occasion of his mem- 
orable nomination for Judge of the th District Court, 

he had gone home to rest after his arduous labors. 

He is too typical a character for us to lose sight of so 
soon. Besides, I have not informed you that, after a 
most exciting campaign, in which he used all the devices of 
a skilled and experienced politician, he was triumphantly 
elected. I wish I could follow Mr. Breezy through the 
varied features of that canvass. His opponent, Gonsfager, 
had the advantage of Mr. Breezy in some trifling par- 
ticulars. For instance, he was well-educated, and had been a 
practicing lawyer of twelve years' standing. Then he could 
make a good public speech, in which no glaring violations 
of the rules of English grammar cropped out for the 
amusement of anybody. Besides, he w^as sarcastic, and 
tried to bring Mr. Breez}' into ridicule. Many people 
thought it a shame for Gonsfager to refer at all to Mr. 
Breezy's want of education and knowledge of law. But 
while Gonsfager was discussing such dry subjects, Breezy 
was continually on the wing, dashing here and there among 
the people, both his hands engaged in shaking those of 
everybody within reach, whether he knew them or not, 



244 THIRTY YEARS 01* NEW YORK POLITICS. 

joking with the women and playfully noticing the babies, 
treating to drinks the "' whole house " when he entered a 
liquor store, which he frequently did ; for in his canvass he 
" covered " every one of these places at least once. In his 
wake, wherever he v/ent, was a choice set of local political 
sports, everyone of whom had a place on the City pay- 
roll, who treated nearly as often as Mr. Breezy him- 
self, button-holed every man they met for his vote for 
Breezy, pledged and argued and promised anything and 
everything for a vote for Breezy. 

Whenever Breezy, or any of his followei'S, met a man who 
frankly told them it was impossible for him to vote their 
way, they never left him until he, at least, promised that he 
" would do Breezy no harm." This wonderful activity was 
kept up all day and far into the night — more frequently, far 
into the next morning. The lightning rapidity of his 
movements gave life and encouragement to his supporters ; 
they vow^ed one and all that he was a " corker" as a candi- 
date. He never missed a point. Even in traveling on the 
rear end of a street car, if he spied an acquaintance on the 
sidewalk, he shouted to him at the top of his voice, and 
waved his good wishes to him, and if he were a person of 
some consequence, he paid him the compliment of jumping 
oif the car to shake hands with him and jiress him into the 
nearest liquor store. 

But it was at social gatherings that Mr. Breezy was at his 
best. From long experience in handling the political cam- 
paigns of others, he knew the exact time to visit these 
festivities. If the entertainment was a ball of a social or 
political club, he timed his appearance there just for the 
moment when the assemblage had retired to the supper- 
room, where all sat at long tables to partake of refresh- 
ments. Then he entered with his retinue, and as every- 
body was seated, all had a chance of a clear view of the 
candidate while he marched between the tables, bowing to 



CROSS-FIRE OF PERSONALITIES. 345 

the right and to the left, with a beaming countenance, and 
with a smile that would soften the heart of even an enemy. 
What could Gonsfager, with all his learning, his powers of 
speech, his knowledge of law, his college diploma, his sar- 
casms and his slurs, do against this soul-stirring and elec- 
trifying canvass of Daniel Breezy ? And so, as you can 
easily understand, Mr. Daniel Breezy was elected Judge by 
a decided majority. 

His triumph over the Columbia College graduate was 
signalized, a few days after election, by a great torch-light 
procession. There were Chinese lanterns, sky rockets and 
blue lights to illuminate the occasion. The streets were 
alive wath an enthusiastic assemblage of men, women and 
children. Men carried in the procession a forest of new 
brooms, to indicate not only a clean sweep of the enemy, 
but the advent of a brand-new system of jurisprudence 
after the first of January. So fervid a demonstration was 
not usual on such occasions. Under ordinary circumstances, 
perhaps, Judge-elect Breezy might have contented himself 
to rest calmly upon his laurels and assume an easy indiffer- 
ence, if not a dignified contempt, towards those who went 
to extremes in assailing him during the heated campaign 
which had just closed. But the abuse to which he had been 
subjected was so virulent and scandalous that he could not, 
with due regard to self-respect, overlook it. Among some 
miscreants the theory finds favor that, by throwing a large 
quantity of mud, some of it is bound to stick ; and it was 
the dread of this result that determined Judge-elect Breezy 
to put himself through a process of thorough moral scour- 
ing, before the figurative mud could take a fast hold on 
him. So he determined very wisely to present himself be- 
fore the people, and furnish ocular and auricular proof that 
he was not as bad as he had been painted by his opponent. 
I have before hinted that, during the campaign, Gonsfager 
had made caustic insinuations regarding Mr, Breezy's lack 



246 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS 

of education ; but you will be surprised to learn that, dur- 
ing the last days of the canvass, doubtless in sheer despera- 
tion, he had come out on the open, and assailed Mr. Breezy 
in the bitterest terms as "an illiterate ignoramus," 

Had Gonsfager confined his assaults on Mr. Breezy's 
character to the ordinary accusations of ballot-box stuffing, 
repeating, trickery, gambling, lying, intoxication, brawling, 
and kindred irregularities which were then, and are even 
today, regarded as within the lines of legitimate "criti- 
cism" in election contests, all would have been well, 
and forgiven and forgotten ; but Gonsfager, with black 
malice in his heart, went so far as to allege that Mr. Breezy 
was ignorant, not only of law, but even of the English lan- 
guage; which reproach was especially offensive in Mr. 
Breezy's case, inasmuch as he knew no other language ; 
and Gonsfager went to the extent of saying in public, and 
in other places, that Mr. Breezy could not write five lines 
grammatically, that he could not talk correct English, not to 
speak of writing it ; and so depraved had the heat of 
the canvass made him, that he even dared to mimic Mr. 
Breezy's pronunciation and phraseology, to the amusement 
of his hearers. 

But Mr. Breezy was going to have another triumph to- 
night. With all the edat of a Judge-elect, he was to make 
a speech before his constituents, and he was determined 
that, while he might not prove himself to be an orator, he 
would at least show them that he was a man who would be 
no disgrace to the Bench. 

In front of Alderman Sheehan's liquor store a platform 
was improvised, with the aid of two trucks and a few whisky 
barrels, before which the paraders assembled in consider- 
able numbers. The local leaders appeared on this platform 
about ten o'clock, and among them was Judge-elect Breezy. 
It is no exaggeration to say that his appearance was greeted 
with tumultuous applause. On order being restored. Judge- 



FIZZLE OF A PREPARED SPEECH, 347 

elect Breezy, looking uimsiially dignified and with almost 
a severe countenance, spoke as follows : 

" Fellow Citizens : I thank you sincerely for this magnificent proces- 
sion which you have got up in my honor." 

[Breezy paid for the whole thing]. This observation, for 
some reason not easy to understand, brought forth vocifer- 
ous applause. The explanation is this : that the new-found 
manner, attitude, voice, distinct enunciation and oratorical 
emphasis, with which Mr. Breezy delivered himself of the 
foregoing sentence, took the audience by such surprise that 
it evoked an applause which the most eloquent phrase of 
the greatest orator could not elicit. Mr. Breezy stood be- 
fore them a new man — " redeemed, regenerated and disen- 
thralled," as it were, " by the irresistible genius " of a 
triumphant election. The applause did not stop when it 
should. It went beyond legitimate bounds. It is recorded 
of a great actor that, in his early career, unexpected ap- 
plause at the termination of some deliverance brought him 
such confusion that he suddenly forgot his lines and made 
a failure of the rest of the part. So it was with Judge-elect 
Breezy. 

Had there been no applause after his first sentence, or if 
even the applause had been moderate, he would, in all 
probability, have recollected not only the next sentence, but, 
perhaps, the entire speech which he had so carefully mem- 
orized. But as it was, the audience shouting, the array of 
new brooms dancing up and down, the torches recklessly 
waving to the right and to the left, giving the scene the 
appearance of a ferocious war dance, with the leaders by 
his side holding their hats high in the air and shaking them 
vigorously, the most experienced orator in the land might 
have been embarrassed. It was little wonder, therefore, that 
Judge-elect Breezy forgot his lines. He saw the tumult 
gradually subsiding, and the audience settling down to hear 
more from him. The consciousness that he forgot the lines 



248 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of the next sentence began to unnerve liim. He tried to 
think of some part of his speech, disregarding sequence or 
connection, but he could not remember even one word. 
He became bewiklered and dumbfounded. He awkwardly 
shifted from one leg to another. His dignity was broken, 
his face lost its judicial gravity, and assumed a silly and 
painful grimace. 

Taking in the situation and ])romptly stepping to the 
front, Mike Hickey said: "Let's all give three cheers 
for Judge Breezy ! " While the audience were in- 
dulging in this pastime, Judge-elect Breezy partly re. 
covered himself, and caught a mental flash of a portion of 
his speech when, at the close of the cheers, Mike Hickey 
shouted : " No slanders of Gonsfager can down a chicken 
out of de blue hen." Now, one of the best sentences of 
Judge-elect Breezy's speech, which had been prepared for 
him by Lawyer Grumpier, was : " No gentleman of Mr. 
Gonsfager s pretensions can justify his conduct in flinging 
scurrilous epithets at his opponent." The name of Gons- 
fager, mentioned by Mike Hickey, brought back remem- 
brance of at least a portion of the above sentence, but it 
would have been better otherwise, for the Judge-elect had 
not recovered his equipoise, and instead of delivering the 
lines verbatim, he spluttered out : 

" Gonsfager— Gonsfager is no gentleman to chuck out dirty epitaphs 
at me. But, as the hour is late, I won't give him no further notice 
to-night. Far be it from me to soil the English language with a man 
like him." 

During the applause which this blistering sarcasm evoked, 
the Judge-elect withdrew. In company with several con- 
genial spirits, he regaled himself at the bar until long after 
midnight ; but not even ten-cent whisky could dispel the 
cloud of gloom which depressed him, as he reflected what a 
dismal failure his part of the demonstration was, and he 
inwardly promised himself that, as long as he lived, he 
never again would attempt to deliver a prepared speech. 



LETTER XXII. 

How THE Joke of a Wag Adjourned a Session of the Board 
OF Aldermen — Description of an East Side Saloon — Its 
Equipment for Rapid Drinking — How it Differed from 
A Lager Beer Place of Refreshment — Noticeable In- 
difference OF Germans to Local Politics— The Shiny 
Hat Brigade and the Duties it Had to Perform. 

My dear Dean : 

At tlie period referred to in the opening of my last letter, 
the liquor dealer was perhaps a more important factor in local 
politics than at any time since, and certainly much more so 
than he is at present. Great men existed before Agamem- 
non, and besides the Judges, the Mayors, and other great 
City officials, there have been and are men in I^ew York 
greater still. Talk not of your Mayors, your corporators 
or your men of law ; the man of liquor, at the time I 
write of, was ahead of them all in influence and importance. 
Priest of the great god Bacchus and deep in the politics of 
the day, he dispensed solid, no less than liquid favors. As 
an instrument of benevolence, or as an agent more or less 
prominent of the Boss, he was invaluable to the man in 
search of a job. The policeman set to watch his move- 
ments was his slave. The New York policeman of those 
days and nights was an amiable as well as a shrewd func- 
tionary, knew where to look for a friend when he wanted 
one, and so M'as not too exacting in the performance of his 
duty where a liquor dealer was concerned. 

O'Connell, the great Irish statesman and lawyer, used to 
boast that he could drive a coach-and-four through any Act 
of Parliament ; a New York liquor dealer could drive a 
whole freight train thi'ougli the most Draconian Excise 

249 



250 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

statute of tlie State Legislature. There was then, as now, a 
Sunday-closing law in New York, and the law with regard 
to other days required that liquor saloons should be closed 
at 1 o'clock A. M. Yet there was one liquor dealer, then 
doing business within a stone's throw of the Law Courts 
and the City Hall, who used to boast that his house had not 
been closed, day or night, for the preceding thirty-nine 
years, and many others could make similar boasts, for 
periods more or less long, according to the age of their 
establishments. If one stepped into a liquor store in those 
days, and, indeed, in times long after those days, it was no 
uncommon sight to see the policeman of the district seated 
by the stove, if in Winter, his baton at rest, and his great 
body relaxed in the easy enjoyment of the hospitalities of 
the house. The law prohibiting the sale of liquor beyond 
certain hours was practically a dead letter; the people 
despised it as an attempt to limit their natural rights, and 
they seemed to have allowed it to be passed only to show 
how easily it could be broken. 

It is not surprising, therefore, that many of the local 
elective offices were then filled by the liquor men. As 
illustrative of this, a story is on record in the daily papers 
of the period, that a certain wag subsidized a newsboy one 
day to rush into the Council Chamber, while the City 
Fathers were in session, and, addressing nobody in particu- 
lar, shout, loud enough for every Alderman to hear, " Mister 
your liquor store is on lire ! " Whereupon, all the members 
of the Board jumped to their feet, and each fearing that 
his store might be the scene of the conflagration, rushed 
pell-mell towards the door in undignified disorder and 
panic. 

This was the condition of local political affairs at the 
time when I, in company with a friend, entered Alderman 
Sheehan's saloon in 1870, as stated in the opening sentence 
of a former letter. 



AN OLD-TIME LIQUOR SALOON. '.^51 

I need not trouble you with any irrelevant remarks on 
the nature of the Ijusiness which took my companion 
(Mr. Jones) and myself to the Alderman's place of busi- 
ness. As it was the Alderman's only place of business, and 
as he had jurisdiction ov^er a large variety of subjects, public 
and private, as before related, many plausible reasons might 
be assigned for our presence there ; but after this long lapse 
of time I prefer leaving the matter to your imagination, 
more especially as I have already said that the night was 
bitterly cold. 

A ISTew York liquor saloon in those days, while not, 
strictly speaking, " a thing of beauty," or so bedizened, 
burnished and illuminated as such places are to-day, when 
they outshine in splendor the ancient palace of the Alham- 
bra, was a cozy and comfortable retreat from the storms of 
the world. The floor, covered with saw-dust, gave a soft 
sensation to the feet, which required but little imagination 
to make one believe, in certain stages of spirituous excita- 
tion, that he was walking on a carpet of elastic and luxuri- 
ous texture. Besides this comfortable feeling, the saw-dust 
kept those who were inclined to be unsteady from slipping 
and giving rise to suggestions that they had drink enough, 
while the absorbent nature of the material itself concealed 
from view the sloppy evidences of tobacco juice and drip- 
ping beer, which would be plainly observable on a bare 
floor. A huge stove, protuberant at the centre and painted 
white, perhaps as an emblem of purity, but in its uncouth 
shape and enormous dimensions resembling more a Hindoo 
idol, stood in the middle of the bar-room, and gave out in- 
tense heat, which had the effect of increasing the bystanders' 
thirst, and, acting in conjunction with a rapid run of drinks, 
stimulated the brain into an abnormal degree of activity. 
A large mirror behind the bar reflected long rows of glasses 
of various sizes and patterns, together with an array of 



2S3 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

bottles and decanters, containing nectars of different hues 
and various degrees of capability. 

The saloon itself was a room about sixty feet in length 
by twenty-five feet wide. There were no chairs or lounges, 
or seats of any kind. This was then, if not altogether now, 
characteristic of the regulation bar-room. The absence of 
these ordinary accommodations, at first sight and without 
proper explanation, may seem indicative of an inhospitable 
feeling, but, rightly considered, it was entirely consistent 
with correct business principles. What was required was 
rapid drinking, not lounging. None of that slow, lazy and 
stupid process of imbibition which is nurtured by chairs 
and tables — where the same men may sit for hours looking 
each other solemnly in the face, without mixing up with 
the general crowd of drinkers — was tolerated in a place 
like this. True, there were then drinking saloons in New 
York where lethargy was promoted even to the extent of 
having easy chairs for guests ; but that was confined dis- 
tinctly to German districts, where the comfortable and 
phlegmatic Teuton sat, smoked his pipe and sipped his beer 
or " schnapps," looking, all the time, as serious and impas- 
sive as a philosopher or a dyspeptic, answered questions in 
monosyllables, yawned, slept and sometimes, it may be, 
snored. It being easy to see, from these and other evi- 
dences, that he was either incapable of grasping the finer 
intricacies of local politics, or, more likely, was indifferent 
to them altogether, the experienced politician readily con- 
cluded that nothing of value could be learned from him. 
By reason of this apathy on the part of his customers, the 
German saloon-keeper himself, having no motive in keep- 
ing himself "posted" in public affairs, knew as much of 
real New York politics as if he had never left the father- 
land. 

It is necessary to dwell at some length on the distinc- 
tion between this lack of taste or capacity on the part of 



AN ENTHUSIASTIC TEUTON. 253 

the New York German for the intrigues of local politics 
(he has been doing better, in later years) and the marvel- 
lous adaptability shown in dealing with them by some of 
the other great foreign born elements, in order to account 
fur the fact that so few of the former used to obtain offices. 
At the same time, it must be said that whenever one of that 
nationality secured a nomination for a local office, the en- 
thusiasm of the German voters of the district was tempo- 
rarily aroused. As this predisposition is even to-day an 
important consideration in analyzing the voting population 
of this city, I deem it prudent, even at the risk of undue 
digression, to narrate an actual occurrence which will more 
thoroughly explain what is meant. 

While an exciting campaign was proceeding for the elec- 
tion of President, there were also contests going on for 
several offices in the State and City governments of New 
York — Governor of the State, Mayor of the City, and 
some subordinate positions, including those of Aldermen 
and Assemblymen from the several districts of the munici- 
pality. Among the rest, the Democrats nominated one 
HeidelgrafE for Alderman, and one O'Brien for Assembly- 
man, in a strongly German district. Of course, the Repub- 
licans had opposing candidates, while still other candidates 
were in the field as representatives of independent organ- 
izations, which largely impaired the strength of the Demo- 
cratic vote, causing it to be, to a certain extent, divided. On 
the day of election, a gentleman named Kiernan, a cultured 
and able man, holding an important public station in con- 
nection with the Board of Public Instruction, and author 
of the celebrated "Destroying Angel" speech in the State 
Legislature, in the days of Tweed — already spoken of — 
was driving through the district referred to, which was in 
the outskirts of the city, and stopped to take lunch at 
Weinheimer's well-known Inn. Host Weinheimer knew 
and had the highest respect for Mr, Kiernan, who had often 



254 THIKTY YEAES OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

before called at the establishment to refresh liiinself and 
his horses, whenever he drove to that part of the city. Al- 
though it was a busy day, being election day, Mr. Wein- 
heimer gave the guest his usual hearty welcome. 

"Well, Mr. Weinheimer," said Mr. Kiernan, "how is 
the election going?" 

" Oh ! Heidelgraff is elected sure," responded Wein- 
heimer. 

" Yes, but how is Cleveland (candidate for President) 
running up here ? " inquired Kiernan. 

" Ach, Gott ! Mr. Kiernan, what's the use ? Heidelgraff 
sure is elected." 

Concluding that National and State politics were not 
within the sphere of Weinheimer's interest or intelligence, 
Mr. Kiernan proceeded to try him on City politics. " Well, 
Mr. Weinheimer, do you think the Democratic candidate 
for Mayor will be elected ? " he asked. 

" Now, we speaks all day, Mr. Kiernan ; it's no use at 
all. Heidelgraff is sure our next Alderman," replied Wein- 
heimer, 

Kiernan was at length willing to come down to district 
issues, and asked, " How will my friend O'Brien, who is 
running up here for Assembly, make out ? " 

" Mr. Kiernan," replied Weinheimer, "no man will beat 
Heidelgraff. You may take it for sure, he is elected ! " 

Kiernan, now a little nettled, said, slowly and with 
marked emphasis : " Mr. Weinheimer, Heidelgraff and 
O'Brien are running together as candidates of the Demo- 
cratic party, one for Alderman and the other for Assembly ; 
you understand, both are friendly to each other in this 
election. Now, you say Heidelgraff is all right. Will my 
friend O'Brien be all right, too ? " 

" Well, Mr. Kiernan," said Weinheimer, looking pained 
at Kiernan's want of comprehension, " I tells you as though 
we talks all day, ach Oott, soil urn behuten^ it's no use. 



"liEiDELGRAFF SURE IS ELECTED." 355 

Yustread to-morrow uiorning early the papers yourself , and 
you will see sure Heidelgraff is elected Alderman." 

Another striking feature of the New York liquor saloon 
is that, diiferent from your European custom, the allotment 
of whiskey is never measured out over the bar to the cus- 
tomer. Your process of delivery of this article is some- 
what tainted with a suspicion of niggardliness ; for when a 
man in London, or Glasgow, or Dublin, or any other part of 
Great Britain or Ireland, steps up to a bar and asks for a 
drink of whiskey, the attendant keeps the bottle contain- 
ing the stimulant in his or her own custody (you have lady 
bar tenders), carefully pours out the drink from a regulation 
pewter measure, as if every drop of it was an extract from 
the golden fruits of the Hesperides ; while in New York, 
and in every city, town, village and hamlet in the United 
States, the bartender (never a woman) fearlessly, and with 
perfect confidence in human nature, delivers the bottle to 
the personal custody of the customer who, without let or 
hindrance, refreshes himself as suits his own taste and 
capacity. It would be most unbecoming of me to criticise 
your business methods, but you yourself must inwardly con- 
fess that this sublime faith in the moderation of human 
appetites, whereof our method of dispensing liquor is a stand- 
ing monument, should forcibly appeal to the better and 
higher part of your natures ! 

But I am not so interested in dilating on the mere 
pliysical and spirituous characteristics of the liquor saloons, 
or on the peculiarities of their proprietors, as I am in the 
attempt to point out the moral and intellectual forces which, 
although limited and uncertain, still at that particular stage 
of our city's history powerfully affected, if they did not 
actually control in the first instance, the machinery of the 
municipal government. 

Let me not be understood that, in speaking of moral and 
intellectual forces, I regard these qualities as having alone 



^6 Thirty years of new york politics. 

achieved the results alluded to. The quickness of percep- 
tion which can see and the tact which can seize upon op- 
portunities at the right time, which can cajole, oi- intimidate, 
as the occasion may demand — all of which I have in mind, 
when I use the expression moral and intellectual forces — 
were employed by the liquor-dealing politician of those 
days, and by those other ward politicians who were attracted 
towards him as the centre and magnet of local political 
power. In addition to them, however, it was essential that 
as district leader he should have behind him a band of de- 
termined men who would be ready, when required, to 
bring the argument of physical force to back up his deci- 
sions as local Boss. 

Thus it came to pass that every such Boss had, by allot- 
ment, a large number of men on the City pay-roll, who 
never did any work, and whose stipend ran all the way from 
ten hundred dollars to fifteen hundred dollars a year. 
Among ordinary individuals these favored personages 
could be easily distinguished not only by a certain swagger 
in their gait, but by the " loud " and striking style of dress, 
the large diamonds and the fashionable high hats they 
wore. They were facetiously termed the- " shiny hat 
brigade " and could be found any afternoon (for late hours 
prevented early rising) on the sunny side of Broadway and 
Fifth avenue, or on the prominent street corners, smoking 
high-flavored cigars, and looking like capitalists. As 
many as twelve or fifteen thousand of these athletic states- 
men disported themselves throughout the city. What pro- 
portion of this body-guard was appropriated to Alderman 
Sheehan's district I am not able to say, but certain it is 
that he had his share. These men, as I have said, did no 
work except attend Primary elections, for the purpose of 
maintaining order— or disorder— thereat as the occasion re- 
quired ; be delegates to local conventions ; keep track of 
the voters; see that they would vote "right:" exact 



USES OF THE SHINY HAT BRIGADE. S57 

promises in advance to vote their way ; promise places and 
favors here and there, M-ithont the slightest intention, in 
numerous cases, of ever fulfilling the promise; threaten 
and intimidate the recalcitrant ; praise the local Boss, and 
sing pagans of adulation and triumph to the Boss-in-chief, 
WiHiam M. Tweed, the then reigning political monarch of 
New York. 



LETTEK XXIII. 

Awakening of the German Element to Its Power and 
Importance— Its Political Activity Excites Alarm in 
the Irish Element — Concessions Made in the Shape of 
Nominations— First Teuton Office-Holders Not a Suc- 
cess—What Brought Down a Pompous Oratorical Al- 
derman—An Appointee Who Thought He Had To Do 
Some Work — His Persistency Ended by "Cutting His 
Wind." 

My dear Dean : 

It was intimated in a preceding letter that, at the time of 
which I was writing, the German element in New York, 
while representing a large number of votes, M-as not hon- 
ored with public office at all commensurate with its im- 
portance as a factor in deciding elections. It was supposed 
by many persons that, on account of the taste and capacity 
of the German for business, and his marked success in manv 
of its most prominent departments, his ambition was con- 
tent to be confined entirely to these pursuits, leaving the 
turmoil and violent activities of politics to the other elements, 
native and foreign born, — especially to the Irish, whose 
avidity for the excitement of political strife seemed more 
than half indigenous to their nature. But such is human 
vanity that, after a while, the Germans began to look 
with an increasing jealousy at the marvelous progress 
of the Irish in the field of politics, and in the more 
alluring field of public patronage. This was not unreasona- 
ble when we consider the circumstances. The predomi- 
nance of their Irish fellow-citizens was a fact brought 
every day obtrusively before their eyes. They were in 
entire control of the Common Council of the city, a body 
important enough to be regarded as a local parliament and 

358 



RACIAL RIVALRY IN THE METROPOLIS. 259 

one Avliicli had probably more real power tliaii anything in 
the nature of a parliament the German had seen in his own 
country prior to that time ; so it was not to be expected that 
he could look on this monopoly of authority without a rising 
pang of envy. Tliis sentiment, however, did not begin to 
take visible form for some time. Young men born in New 
York, of German parentage, were the main factors in 
arousing and stimulating it into activity. 

Anxious for political preferment themselves, they eluded 
the elder Germans on their want of "■ public spirit," and 
drew their attention to the fact that the latent power rest- 
ing in them was being frittered away until it had become 
an object, if not of open ridicule, at least of something 
very like contempt. Indeed, this, to a certain extent, was 
true, for the uneven distribution of power and patronage 
was so glaring as to be made the subject of many jokes and 
jibes at the expense of the German. The situation forced 
itself through a variety of channels into public notice, and 
found its way even to the stage. A noted and versatile 
comedian of the time, the late Dan Bryant, added fuel to 
the flame by playfully satirizing, while pretty clearly indi- 
cating, the relative positions of the parties, in one of his 
songs, set to a popular air. The burden of the song was a 
mock invitation to the Irish to go out West, and occupy 
themselves in cutting down the primaeval forests as their 
proper sphere of action, followed by their emphatic but 
humorous refusal to do so, as expressed in the following 
refrain : 

" No ! Let the Dutchmen go out there and work. 
But, be jabers, we'll stick to the city ! " 

These and similar jocularities, combined with arguments 
and importunities of the young and ambitious German- 
American, began to do their work. 

It was not long before there appeared organizations in 
several German strongholds, under the names of "The 



260 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Germ an- American Association of the Assembly Dis- 
trict," '' The Independant German Democracy of the 

Ward," and others of a similar character. These clubs, 
after a while, began to grow in number and importance, 
and to assume, what not unnaturally appeared to politicians 
in power, an alarming and even threatening attitude. They 
were fast approaching that stage, always dangerous to 
machine rule, in which they could hold the balance of 
power between the two great parties of the city, and so be 
able to control as they pleased the destinies of either. 

Irish-American politicians began to see danger of invasion, 
or rather of intrusion, into their domain, and protested against 
the existence of such Clubs as " un-American." They argued, 
and, in truth, argued justly, that there should be no such 
designation as "German-American," that w^e were all 
" Americans," and that the adoption of any prefix which 
limited or qualified the term, more especially one of foreign 
significance, reflected upon its dignity and robbed the citizen 
of his highest honor. 

I recall one politician who took a specially dismal view 
of the situation. Ever since he came from Ireland, twenty 
years before, he had been favored by fortune. At the time 
I speak (tf, and for many years previously, he occupied the 
position of Justice of one of the District Courts of New 
York — tribunals of limited jurisdiction. At a complimentary 
dinner to a politician just elected to Congress, Judge Con- 
nors (the gentleman in question) was an invited guest. At 
an advanced hour of the evening, he was called upon for a 
speech. The Judge, evidently bearing in mind the fact 
that this new activity of the Germans was a menace to his 
own security, as one of the would-be local Bosses, espe^sially 
as his term of office was about to expire, delivered himself 
of the following warning, with great impressiveness and 
judicial gravity : 



A HANDICAPPED ALDERMAN. 26l 

" Gentlemen, I know not what you may think of the situa- 
tion, but /view with great alarm the growth of the German 
element in this country of ours." 

The strife between the tw^o great foreign born elements 
did not, of course, go so far as an open declaration of hos- 
tilities ; but it existed, nevertheless, in a quiet and repressed 
form. The great quartette which constituted the tlien exist- 
ing Ring (Tweed, Sweeny, Connolly and Hall)— of all of 
whom I shall have something to say hereafter — observing 
that this new power, if notliandled judiciously, might prove 
to be a disturbing element, shrewdly resolved both to avert 
the danger and capture the German influence by granting 
it some concessions in the way of nominations. 

Accordingly, in three districts thickly peopled by Ger- 
mans, they were permitted to name three candidates for 
Aldermen, and the three were easily elected. Among them 
was one Louis Bamberger, Although a man of ordinary 
education, Bamberger was a member of the Bar, but his 
professional labors were altogether confined to the local 
Courts, either civil or criminal. With a wonderfully sonor- 
ous and aggressive voice, he could make himself heard in 
the largest hall, and in the open air to an incredible extent, 
whenever he harangued his fellow countrymen, which he 
frequently did. 

He believed it was his special mission to exemplify Ger- 
man genius in the field of ^oratory, and that by making- 
addresses on all available occasions he would raise the stand- 
ing of his long-neglected countrymen in the politics of the 
City. 

Numerous were the speeches he delivered in the 
Board of Aldermen, but it is not on record that he was ever 
able to procure the passage of a solitary ordinance. There 
was a policy underlying this check to his success. For some 
years preceding his accession to the office, his district was 
represented by Alderman Kearns, a silent, but active and 



262 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

persistent man, who had been the means of passing numerous 
ordinances of local interest relating to the flagging of side- 
walks, repairing of streets, erection of watering-troughs, 
establishment of gas lamps, and many other requirements of 
his district. Now. nothing of this character was being ac- 
complished under Alderman Bamberger, and, as a conse- 
quence, he was suifering by contrast in the estimation of 
his constituents. This loss in prestige greatly exasperated 
him, and he had got into a habit of giving at each session 
of the Board many evidences of a temper sadly soured, and 
of his determination to resent the injuries inflicted upon his 
reputation. 

Instead, however, of this behavior having any mollifying 
effect upon his colleagues, it only made them the more res- 
olute in their course of obstruction to his measures, and the 
more anxious to still further belittle him by a reckless in- 
dulgence of their wit at his expense. Driven almost to des- 
peration, he cared little what language he used in criticizing 
them. On one occasion, he made a speech, in which his 
voice was raised to a pitch that was in itself a challenge to 
battle. " You," said he, addressing his associates in bulk, 
" are called ' The Forty Thieves.' I don't know as you de- 
serve it, for you keep me outside the inside circle. But I 
am ready to stand before any man here, face to face, and 
will meet him as a foe worthy of my steel." 

" Which steal do you mean, Louis F' broke in Alderman 
Maloney, in a cynically signiflcant tone of voice. The audi- 
tors burst into derisive shouts of laughter at the sally, which 
brought Alderman Bamberger to an abrupt halt, gasping 
and dumbfounded. 

The heads of Departments, however, did not completely 
ignore Alderman Bamberger, and some small quota of the 
patronage which was then the perquisite of Aldermen, was 
allotted to him. Even in the " handling " of this simple 
matter he was a failure. It was, perhaps, no fault 



AN UNSOPHISTICATED INSPECTOR. ^-«3 

of his that he was not educated up to the times, but he had 
certainly a very dim knowledge of what " patronage meant 
in those days. It is no slander of him to say that m this 
particular he was absolutely crude, or exceptionally 
innocent,justasyou may wish to viewit. He had, to be sure, 
a general knowledge that large sums were appropriated tor 
public improvements, but he had never considered analytic- 
ally or minutely how they were expended. He had not 
yet been sufficiently on the -inside" to know that many 
thousands of persons were drawing stipends for which they 

did no work. 

The first bit of patronage he procured was an inspector- 
ship in the Bureau of Street Cleaning, then nnder the con- 
trol of tbe Police Department, and this position Alderman 
Bamberger hastened to bestow npon a faithful adherent, 
Jacob Switzer, whose regular trade was that of barber, but 
who bad recently failed in business. While Switzer had 
some skill in giving a " close shave," be had little idea of 
"close" business in politics. The Inspectorship brought 
him four dollars a day, and Switzer was a proud man. He 
felt within himself that, as he had worked hard for the 
Democratic party-which, in liis eyes, was personitied m 
Bamberger-Eepublics, after all, were not nngrateful, and 
he was determined that, however he might have neglected 
his business as a tonsorial artist, he would give loyal and 
faithful service to the City which had so generously em- 
ployed him. Bnt, while willing to work, he had received 
no instructions as to the line of his duty, nor was he told m 
what part of the City he should exercise his official func- 
tions. Nor was Alderman Bamberger, who handed him 
the appointment in person, able to give him the necessary 
information. Switzer was a man of some thought, so he 
studied the question himself, and finally concluded that an 
Inspectorship in the Street Cleaning Bureau must neces- 
sarily involve an inspection of the public street8,with reports 



264 TFIIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

from time to time, at headquarters, concerning any incum- 
brances or nuisances whicli impeded travel or were offens- 
ive to the citizens. 

With a simplicity which is entirely to his credit, he sup- 
posed he had actually to do some work for the compensa- 
tion he received, and never for a moment dreamed tliat he 
was enjoying an absolute sinecure. Accordingly, he set out 
on his travels in the performance of his supposed duty. In 
those days, a street inspector had not to travel far before he 
met objects deserving his official disapproval. Switzer made 
this discovery, perhaps, sooner than usual. Things which 
durino; a long residence in the neio-hborhood he had never 
much noticed before, now, under the stimulus of official res- 
ponsibility, caught his eye and arrested his attention. As 
it was in his own neighborhood, and on the principle that 
" charity begins at home," he was determined that his first 
official act should be directed to the removal of an unsightly 
heap of malodorous filth which, for many weeks, had been 
reposing without interference on First avenue, near 
Tenth street. Other streets in his Ward were similarly 
afflicted, but, with the spirit of home-rule burning within 
him, he decided to address himself first to this particular 
heap. Next day he took to the Chief Clerk of the Street 
Cleaning Bureau a written report, in which, among other 
things, he stated that " there is a big heap of rubbish and 
dirt in First avenue near Tenth street. It should be re- 
moved." 

"All right," said the Chief Clerk. 

Switzer waited for four days, and again reported to the 
Chief Clerk — " That heap of rubbish and dirt on First 
' avenue is still there." 

« All right," said the Chief Clerk. 

Five days elapsed, and Switzer, feeling that his official 
authority had not been properly respected, reported in 
more vigorous language : " That lieap of rubbish and 



FATAL ZEAL OF A NEW OFFICIAL. 365 

dirt on First avenue is still there. I have it reported 
already twice, but it still stays there, and what is worse, it 
grows bigger at both ends and the middle." 

The Chief Clerk read the report and, looking solemnly 
at Switzer, said : " See here, you don't know nothing ! Will 
you ever drop on yourself ? You're a bigger nuisance to 
this Bureau than the rubbish. Your wind is cut by order 
of the Superintendent. See ? " 

" My vind cut — what you mean ? " asked Switzer in sur- 
prise. 

"You're discharged. That's the meaning," curtly re- 
plied the Chief Clerk. 

Now, this summary discharge of Switzer for no cause 
whatever, or rather for a cause which, to the unsophisticated 
mind, ought to have commended him, was strictly in line 
with the policy and practice governing this particular 
branch of the public service— and, indeed, most other 
branches of it as well. In fact, under the arrangements 
for the expenditure of funds at the disposal of the 
officials, there was no other course open to them but to 
order Switzer's discharge, for he was not only annoy- 
ing the Bureau, but he was seriously embarrassing it. 
You may naturally inquire how? The explanation is 
simphcity itself. The Board of Estimate and Apportion- 
ment, in December of each year, allowed a specified sum 
in bulk for cleaning the streets of the City, which sum 
could not be increased, under the law, during that year. 
Now, there were so many persons of political importance 
looking after this fund, for the purpose of getting \vhat 
was termed a " rake " out of it, that it is plain, if all the 
streets were cleaned, it would have so reduced the fund that 
this " business " arrangement could not be carried out. On 
the other hand, it needs no profound knowledge of finance 
to conclude that if a number of persons divide amoug tliem- 
selves any considerable portion of the sura originally ap- 



266 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

propriated for cleaning all the streets, by no ingenuity or 
financial jugglery could all the streets be cleaned. It is 
obvious, therefore, that if all the streets were to be cleaned, 
a great injustice would necessarily have to be done to those 
"tried and trusty" veterans of the party, who were to 
share in what was known as the "divvy." From this 
point of view, it was evidently impossible to remove from 
First avenue the heap of dirt complained of by Switzer ; 
for, if this were done, ten to one Switzer, thus en- 
couragedj would have gone on reporting the existence of 
numerous other accumulations of dirt, until such a bad ex- 
ample was set to the other inspectors as would bring in- 
evitable embarrassment and financial injury to those who 
had a sinecure " interest " in the Bureau. 

Besides, considering the location of the nuisance in 
question, the urgency of Switzer was absurd. Up to the 
time of this unhappy episode, no one had ever heard of the 
streets in that neighborhood being cleaned more than once 
a month ; hence, to carry out a practice such as was indicated 
by the zeal of Switzer, was something that the residents in 
that section never expected. 

Taking these views of his conduct, it is therefore plain 
that Switzer fairly earned his discharge. 



LETTER XXIV. 

"Irrepressible Conflict ''Between two Races— Too Much 
Official Recognition of St. Patrick's Day Breeds 
Trouble — Mayor Hall Reviews a Parade in the Re- 
galia OF AN Irish Prince — Anger of the German Press 
AND Indignation of German Clubs — Political Ava- 
lanche "Which Made a Baker State Senator in Spite of 
Himself. 

My dear Dean: 

The " irrepressible conflict," referred to in my last letter, 
between the German and Irish elements in New York for 
ascendancy in the Democratic politics of the City, was con- 
ducted in a manner not always observable on the surface, 
but was, nevertheless, making considerable headway in favor 
of German recognition in certain of the East-side districts. 

This condition was. to a large degree, stimulated by the 
behavior of the Irish themselves. As English politicians have 
always alleged that the Irish in Ireland were unfit for self- 
government, so the Irish-American politicians of that era 
asserted that the Germans in New York were unfit for pub- 
lic office. The spirit of exclusion in both cases had its 
origin from exactly the same cause, namely, the desire of 
those in possession to keep all the good things to them- 
selves. Besides, the methods adopted by the exclusionists 
were the same, viz. to heap ridicule on those who were 
seeking recognition. There is no stronger moral force 
than ridicule in certain cases ; but it has its limits. If car- 
ried too far, it defeats the very purpose of its application. 
Whether it was in pursuance of a deliberate plan, or was a 
mere manifestation of natural jocularity, I am not able to 
determine ; but, from whatever cause, certain it is that the 

267 



268 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

German's political aspirations were made tlie subject of 
many practical jokes at tlie hands of the Irish. I well 
remember the case of poor Beedleburger, an honest, harmless 
and credulous German, who kept a lager beer saloon in 
Second avenue, not far from Fifth street. Perhaps the 
last man in the world to aspire for public office was Beedle- 
burger, if let alone. He had a very limited knowledge of 
English, and never attempted to converse in that language 
unless compelled to do so by the lack of knowledge of his 
own tongue on the part of his customers. Whenever he 
did converse in English, his words came forth slowly and 
with the utmost caution, while his countenance assumed a 
curiously suspicious aspect. He dreaded to have his pro- 
nunciation and use of English words made the subject of 
ridicule by the young bloods who occasionally drank his 
beer. This peculiarity gave rise to much merriment, and 
his style of utterance was mimicked in the political club 
which had its headquarters in the immediate neighborhood, 
until the name of Beedleburger became well-known among 
the noisy coterie who followed the banner of Tammany 
Hall. As the time of nominating candidates drew near, in 
the Fall, some one suggested jocosely, at the Club, that 
Beedleburger be nominated for Alderman. The proposi- 
tion evoked great merriment, and several comical recitations 
of imaginary speeches were delivered in broken, or rather 
in " Beedleburger " English, which were to electrify the 
Board of Aldermen. 

After various suggestions it was determined that, without 
further delay, posters should be printed, and put upon the 
dead walls and fences in the neighborhood, announcing his 
candidacy, and that on the following day a delegation should 
wait upon him, and with mock formality inform him that 
his nomination and election for Alderman were desired by 
a large portion of the citizens of the district, and that, 
moreover, he was the unanimous choice of the Owl Club ; 



"PUTTING UP A JOB'* ON AN INNOCENT. 269 

for such was tlie name of the chil) referred to — derived, 
no doubt, from the midniglit orgies of its members. 

Knowing the skeptical nature of Beedleburger, the 
" delegation " drummed into service one Jacob Schneider, 
who was a " runner " for one of the City Marshals attached 
to the local Court, and who was anxious to curry favor with 
the members of the Owl Club, through whose influence he 
hoped some day to obtain a place in the public service. 
Thus equipped for carrying out the joke, the delegation 
waited upon the proposed candidate. 

Taken by surprise at the proposition, Beedleburger at 
first hesitated between doubt and ambition, but, after some 
time, through the diplomacy of Schneider, in whom he had 
great confidence, he retired for consultation with his wife. 
It is a noticeable fact that women are always the first to 
succumb to the anticipated glamor of political honors. She 
not only consented to the proposition, but she expressed 
surprise that a man like her husband had not been sought 
out for such a distinction long before. When Beedle- 
burger returned to the saloon his face was wreathed in 
smiles. As a matter of course " he set them up," again and 
again ; that is to say, he treated several times, (up to this 
event he had never been known to treat,) and after many 
assurances that he was "the next Alderman " the commit- 
tee withdrew. 

Any excitement, be it serious or jocose, which breaks the 
monotony of everyday life, is liable to become contagious. 
Successful beyond their expectations, the conspirators grew 
buoyant and exuberant at the prospect of the fun ahead. 
They found many recruits, who added ardor as well as 
numbers to the movement, until toward night the entire 
neighborhood was alive with enthusiasm for Beedleburger. 
They procured numerous persons all day long to wait upon 
and congratulate the candidate and give him assurance 
of liis triumphant election. Not content with this, the 



270 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

spirit of fun spread in otlier directions. The posters, an- 
nouncing in huge letters his candidacy, were conspicuous on 
the dead walls and fences as well as in bar-rooms and 
saloons in the neighborhood. The posters read as follows : 



BEEDLEBURGER FOR ALDERMAN. 

THE people's choice. 

THE FRIEND OF THE WORKINGMAN ! 

Gives a Large Schooner of Beer and Free Lunch of Bread 
AND Bologna ! 

ALL HANDS TALL OUT AND VOTE FOR BEEDLEBURGER ! 



^ Nor did this inspiring and patriotic appeal satisfy the 
enthusiasts. They concocted other plans for the canvass. 
When night came on, they hired what is known as a 
" gutter band,'' composed of four instruments of discordant 
and dyspeptic tones, and, with a few lighted torches, 
formed a parade along the street, passing and repassing in 
front of his saloon, and shouting " Three cheers for Beedle- 
burger ! " " Beedleburger is the man ! " and similar com- 
plimentary outbursts. It is not to be wondered at that 
such apparent enthusiasm woke up whatever there was of 
emotion in the soul of Beedleburger, who Avas so moved 
that he actually opened two kegs of beer and invited the 
surging and hilarious multitude to accept his hospitality. 
More than this, still later in the night he forwarded an- 
other keg of beer to the Owl Club, with " Com.pliments of 
Herman Beedleburger," written in English by his treach- 
erous friend, Schneider. 

It was great fun, but it had its reaction ; for, when Michael 



REACTION OF THE pEEDLEBURGER JOKE. 271 

Hogan was iioniinated for Alderman the following even- 
ing, and especially wlien Beedleburger discovered that he 
had been made the victim of a practical joke, his indigna- 
tion and that of his German friends knew no bounds. They 
refused to vote for Hogan under any circumstances ; but 
that mattered little, in a strongly Democratic district. The 
joke, however, combined with other circumstances, subse- 
quently exercised considerable influence in shaping the 
future of the Germans in the politics of that part of the 

city. 

Besides the uneven distribution of power and patronage 
in favor of the Irish, there were other circumstances, of a 
more superficial character, which created still further jeal- 
ousy on the part of the Germans. Most conspicuous of 
these, perhaps, was the annual parade on St. Patrick's Day. 
It is only fair to say that the Germans took no exception 
to the demonstration itself, or to the right of the Irish to 
turn out in honor of their great patron Saint. The Ger- 
mans had their own distinctive parades during the year. 
To be sure, their parades were not in honor of any great 
Saint, nor, indeed, of any saint at all, but only to celebrate 
mere mundane things, such as " Pfingsten," "Volksfest," 
" Schiitzenfest," and so forth, when they marched to the 
places of entertainment, in semi-military style, certain co- 
horts of them carrying arms and equipments, and stepping, 
as best they could, to the strains of martial music. So that 
they could not be so unreasonable as to object to St. Pat- 
rick's Day Parade merely as a parade. 

Kevertheless, they had cause for being aggrieved. When 
they paraded, there were no flags flying from our municipal 
buildings. The Stars and Stripes were not floating in ex- 
ultant glory from the flagstaff of the City Hall. No Mayor 
or civic authorities assembled in state to review them as 
they passed by. Xot so with the Irish parade. At the 
time I speak of, and, indeed, to a great extent yet, on such 



273 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

occasions, the whole political firmament was profoundly 
agitated. There was not a politician in the city, nor a man 
who aspired to^be a politician, who was not on the qtii vive^' 
who did not dress himself in his best garments ; who did 
not wear a high silk hat ; who did not put a sprig of sham- 
rock, if he could get it, or a green ribbon if he could not, in 
the lapel of his coat, to mark his reverence of the day and 
his burning ardor for the cause of Erin. 

St. Patrick's Day of the year 1870 was a memorable one. 
A. Oakey Hall was Mayor of the City ; Richard B. Con- 
nolly, (familiarly known as " Slippery Dick," for reasons 
which will appear when I come to a discussion of the 
Ring,) was Comptroller of the City, and was also the 
" Grand Council " of the St. Patrick's Mutual Alliance 
which had been organized by him for his special benefit, 
or, more properly speaking, for his protection against the 
growing despotism of Tweed ; Peter !B. Sweeny was City 
Chamberlain ; Richard O' Gorman was Corporation Coun- 
sel ; Thomas Coman was President of the Board of Alder- 
men. All the Irish societies of the city, under the com- 
mand of a chosen Marshal, who rode a horse gorgeously 
caparisoned, assembled at different points and ultimately 
made one vast army, forty thousand strong, headed, first 
by a platoon of police on horseback, next by a platoon of 
police on foot, led by the Superintendent of Police. A 
delegation of the second order of political grandees fol- 
lowed in open landaus, nodding and smiling on all sides to 
the applauding multitudes, who lined the streets, while the 
air was filled with music by the numerous bands, leading 
the several divisions and brigades of the vast army. 

The line of march, as a matter of course, passed by the 
City Hall, and it was here that it received, during the five 
hours of its passing, the greatest ovation. On an elevated 
platform erected in front of the City Hall, stood Mayor A. 
Oakey Hall (supported by the Aldermen and other digni- 



A ST. PATRICK'S DAt PARADE. 2^3 

taries of the City) in the supposed I'egalia of an Irish Prince. 
It was not enough for him to put a shamrock on the lapel 
of his coat. This would have been too tame to represent 
the enthusiasm for Ireland which filled his bosom. So, to 
adequately typify his consuming love for the " Exiles of 
Erin,'* he wore a coat of green material and a flourishing 
cravat of the same inspiring color. 

As I stood among the crowd in front of the City Hall 
that day, I heard many comments on the magnificent phys- 
ical a]3pearance of the men in line. Broad-shouldered, 
muscular, buoyant, orderly and disciplined, they inarched 
in double ranks of twenty a-breast. In the midst of the 
acclamations which greeted them, I heard a man of genteel 
appearance and manners express his surprise at their large 
numbers, and I said to him, " Are you an Irishman, sir ? " 

'" No," he answered, with a merry twinkle in his eye ; " I 
wish to Heaven I was. I am only an American ! " 

The day, although threatening a storm (it generally rains 
in New York on St. Patrick's Day) held up until the 
parade, which continued imtil nightfall, was ended, when a 
drenching rain drove the people off the streets into saloons 
and hotel cafes. Had the spirit of Thomas Campbell re- 
visited earth that day and been able to see his " Poor 
Exile of Erin " at the Astor House and at the St. Nicholas 
Hotel, drinking champagne at four dollars a bottle, he 
would have been obliged to confess that, although the 
Irishman had left his native land, " a home and a country 
remained " for him in New York. 

Indulging in some merriment over this aspect of Irish- 
men's altered condition, a versifier, who happened to be in 
my company on the evening in question, tossed off these 
impromptu lines : — 

" God help the poor Exiles in Ireland, 
As they sit by the wild ocean's foam, 
For 'tis they that are Exiles entirely, 

While we are here more than at home ! " 



274 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

About one thousand prominent citizens sat down that 
evening to a banquet at Dehnonico's, one of the most 
fashionable hotels in the city, as guests of the Friendly 
Sons of St. Patrick ; and about the same number at another 
fashionable hotel, under the auspices of the Knights of St. 
Patrick. As before stated, although the day was fine, the 
night was stormy. While we partook of the dinner of the 
Friendly Sons, it was observed that one seat, immediately at 
the right hand of the chairman, was vacant. Who was to 
fill it ? Towards the end of the courses, there came toward 
this seat the great orator of the evening, and perhaps as 
charming a speaker as has lived in any age — the Irish 
Patriot, Richard O'Gorman. He bowed graciously to the 
greetings accorded him, and took the vacant chair. As he 
rose to speak, he presented a dignified and aristocratic ap- 
pearance, tall, graceful and handsome. His range of thought 
and elegance of diction, combined with an extremely musical 
voice, enchained his hearers in a way that I have never seen 
equalled, before or since. His first words were : " The 
stormy month of March was gentle with us Irishmen to-day, 
while we paraded the streets and avenues of this great city, 
until we have met here this evening when" (taking a bottle 
of champagne in his hand and holding it aloft) " we can 
make fair weather for ourselves within," 

The apparent honor — almost homage — paid to the Irish 
element by those who were in control of the municipal gov- 
ernment, and by the politicians of the City generally, had the 
effect of stimulating the German Clubs into greater activity 
and determination. The German Press of JSTew York also 
took a hand in the matter, and urged unity and consolid- 
ation in their ranks, predicting that the " Reign of Terror," 
as the rule under Tweed was sometimes called, would soon 
come to an end. When the disclosures of the enormous 
peculations of the " Ring," in 1871, burst upon the com- 
munity, the German Press, especially that part of it wliich 



LACK OF FAITH IN POLITICIANS. 275 

had had no share of the Corporation advertising, was 
particularly bitter in its denunciation of the malefactors, 
and a large number of the intelligent German element 
became active in organizing the political movement for 
the overthrow of the existing dynasty. 

In the strong German settlements, however, the simple- 
minded German had but little knowledge of the political 
upheaval which was taking place, and could yet see no pros- 
pects of political preferment for himself. The Committee 
of Seventy, organized for the purposes of municipal reform, 
shrewdly recognized the Germans in nominations for public 
oflBce, but so little skilled in the art of local politics was the 
ordinary German of that day, that he was doubtful and un- 
certain whenever a nomination was tendered to him. 

A curious instance of this want of faith in the sincerity 
of politicians occurred in the " avalanche," as the Fall elec- 
tion of 1871 was styled. I^Tot far from the saloon of the 
unfortunate Beedleburger, lived and prospered one Augus- 
tus Bader, a German, who was a well-known baker of that 
locality. Bader was a man of strict business habits, and 
was held among his own people to be a person of considera- 
ble importance in a business point of view. Besides, he had 
endeared himself to many by generous contributions of 
bread from his bakery to the poor. The Germans who 
were co-operating with the Committee of Seventy presented 
the name of Bader as the nominee for State Senator against 
the Tammany Hall candidate. He was readily accepted, as 
the fittest person to consolidate the German vote of the 
district. He was accordingly nominated,* a committee was 
named to notify him, and the convention adjourned sine die. 
Here the difficulty began. When the committee, composed 
of three most respectable gentlemen, waited upon Bader, 
about nine o'clock that evening, they found him in his little 
baker's shop, in his shirt sleeves, wearing a white apron, 
and attending to his customers. He could speak the Eng- 



376 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

lisli language fairly, so tliere was no difficulty with the 
committee on that score. 

After a formal introduction, the committee announced 
their mission, whereupon he glanced at them a moment, 
and then directly walked off to supply the demands of a 
waiting customer. He went on attending to business, abso- 
lutely ignoring the presence of the committee, who were 
waiting for his return at the rear end of the store. At 
length, George Hasgrove, chairman of the committee, be- 
coming somewhat impatient, walked forward towards Bader, 
and said, with impressive courtesy: 

" Mr, Bader, you understand what we have said to you ; 
that we have been sent as a committee by the Convention, to 
inform you that you have received its nomination, and will 
be endorsed by the Kepublicans, for Senator of this district." 

Bader, in the act of arranging a pile of loaves, stopped, 
put his hands into his trousers pockets, and, his face suffused 
with anger, looked Hasgrove straight in the face, and said : 
"You think a tam fool I am. You have another Beedle- 
burger alretty, eh ? Now let me tell you, you better get 
oud tam quick. I shtand no nonsense beesness ; you hear 
me ? So get oud ! " 

At this he looked towards Krooper, one of the committee 
whom he had known for several years, and, observing him 
smiling, broke out, angrily. " You, Mr. Krooper, ought 
more sense have, than make a fooling beesness like this. 
I want my little shtore to myself ; so you all better leave 
here, right away." 

In vain did the committee protest, or rather attempt to 
protest, that they were on an honest and serious errand. 
Bader would listen to nothing they said, but grew more 
angry every moment, raising his voice and occasionally talk- 
ing in German, in which now and then the name of Beedle- 
burger was heard. 

The committee, observing that Bader had worked himself 



ELECTED IN SPITE OF HIMSELF. 277 

into an ugly temper, concluded to withdraw from the 
scene. They plainly saw that he imagined they were 
'attempting to play a practical joke upon him. Krooper 
instantly divined the cause of Bader's excitement, for he 
knew of the Beedleburger incident, but forgot about it 
until Bader had referred to it. The committee, once ap- 
prised of this, concluded, of course, that when Bader under- 
stood the matter properly, he would begin to take an interest 
in the election, and contribute the usual sum towards the 
expenses. 

But in this they were mistaken; for, although the canvass 
continued for two weeks, Bader would permit no one to 
speak to him on the subject. Several of his personal 
friends, seeing his name on the regular bills, and hearing 
orators, night after night, dilate on his character and ability 
as a successful business man, who had a big heart for the 
poor, and convinced that liis nomination was genuine, took 
upon themselves to induce him to attend even one meeting ; 
but, on the mere mention of the subject, he flew into a 
towering rage and accused them of being in the conspiracy 
to make a fool of him. Bader knew that his name was on 
the bills, that these bills were jDosted on dead-walls and 
fences and hung up in saloons, but he knew also that 
Beedleburger's name had received the same prominence a 
year before, and that he was not only made fun of, but 
that it had cost him about fifty dollars in treating his sup- 
posed friends. Bader remained inflexible to the last, keep- 
ing strictly to his business during the day, and confining 
himself within doors at night, (he resided over his bakery,) 
and he never contributed one cent toward the election, 

Nevertheless, he was elected, being swept along on the 
crest of the tidal-wave which submerged the Democratic 
party in this City, and which accomplished the first step in 
the downfall, disgrace and punishment of the oligarchy 
which then ruled and robbed Kew York. 



LETTER XXY. 

Exciting Legislative Episode Showing the Disadvantage 
OF too Small a Majority — How an Ill-Tempered Bully 
Disorganized Legislative Business — A Blow which Dis- 
sipated Democratic Supremacy and Produced Chaos- 
Resolve OF THE Republicans to " Boss the Ranch or 
Block the Game"— How the Gordian Knot was Cut — 
Ruin which Followed the Man who Cut It. 

My dear Dean : 

One of the most exciting sessions of the Legislature 
on record was that of the year 1871. The returns of 
the canvass of 1870 showed that sixty-five Democrats and 
sixty-three Republicans had been elected to the Assembly, 
but the contest in one of the New York districts, repre- 
sented by Charles Crary, Democrat, was so close that 
H. McK. Twombley, Republican, presented a claim to 
his seat in the Assembly, and a somewhat protracted in- 
vestigation was had. The Committee decided in favor of 
the sitting member, Mr. Crary ; and thus the Democrats 
had a majority of two — very close, but just enough to pass 
a bill, sixty-five votes being the constitutional number. 
Of course this majority, small as it was, sufficed to give 
the Democrats the organization of the House ; so William 
Hitchman w^as again seated in the Speaker's chair, and 
John C. Jacobs, as chairman of the Committee on Ways 
and Means, was the recognized leader on the floor of 
the House, The closeness of the vote, and the liability of 
party questions coming unexpectedly to the front, made 
every member on the Democratic side very punctual in his 
attendance and attentive to his duties. Legislative busi- 
ness, as a result, was rapidly advanced ; and it was deter- 

278 



DISGRACEFUL CONDUCT OF A LEGISLATOR. 379 

mined by the Boss to make the session of 1871, if 
possible, the shortest on record. And so it probably would 
have been, but for an unforeseen occurrence which caused 
great trouble and, as an incident thereto _, great scandal. 

On the evening of the seventh of April, the peace of 
the Assembly was broken by an exhibition of brutality 
without precedent in the history of the 'New York Legis- 
lature. A bill to repeal the law and annul the contract by 
which the Albany and Susquehanna Kailroad was leased to 
the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company, after having 
once received the condemnation of the Assembly, had 
been again brought to the surface by the chairman of the 
Railroad Committee, John L. Flagg, of Rensselaer county, 
who asked for a suspension of the rules, in order that he 
might introduce a resolution that the Railroad Committee 
be discharged from the farther consideration of the bill, 
and that the same be ordered to a third reading. While 
Mr. Flagg was endeavoring to influence the House by a 
special plea that the bill was one altogether in the interest 
of the people and ought to receive legislative approval, 
Smith M. Weed, of Clinton county, entered the Assembly 
chamber, and, having ascertained the object of the resolu- 
tion, proceeded to the Clerk's desk to scrutinize the tally of 
"yeas" and "nays." While there, James Irving, of New 
York city, also a member of the Railroad Committee, pre- 
suming that Mr. Weed was about to take an aggressive 
stand against the bill, applied some abusive epithets to him, 
and finally gave him a push. Mr. Weed, in an indignant 
manner, told him to go away — that he wanted nothing to 
do with him; whereupon Irving attempted to strike him. 
Both men then rushed into the Clerk's room, in the rear of 
the Speaker's desk, where Irving struck Weed a powerful 
blow in the face, inflicting an ugly gash under his eye, 
knocked his head against the door-post, and would doubtless 
have inflicted other injuries upon Mr. Weed, had he not 



280 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

been restrained by those who surrounded him, Irving was 
a man of extraordinary physical power, and considered 
himself a matcli for almost any fighting man in the country. 
Weed, a lawyer by profession, and peaceful in dispos'.- 
tion, made no pretensions to muscular development, and 
had sought to avoid a collision with Irving. 

As may be imagined, the House was profoundly excited 
over this occurrence, and a committee was at once appointed 
to investigate the circumstances of the case, and recom- 
mend such action as in their opinion might be considered 
necessary. The members of the House, indignant at the 
unwarranted conduct of Mr. Irving, could hardly restrain 
their desire to expel him at once ; but cooler heads re- 
quested that all further action should await the report of 
the Special Committee. Seeing the demand for Irving's 
expulsion so overwhelmingly strong, Tweed, notwithstand- 
ing he knew Irving's retirement would leave all pending New 
York legislation in a perilous position — for the Demo- 
crats unaided would be powerless to pass a bill — persuaded 
Irving to resign his seat in the House, which action Irving 
accompanied with the following letter : 

To the Honorable The Speaker of the Assembly : 

Sir : — There is no man who thinks on his past life, but calls to mind 
words that he would wish unspoken, and things done that he would 
wish undone. We have all much to regret and much to forgive. For 
my share in the unhappy occurrence of last Friday evening, which 
occupies the attention of the House, I am sincerely sorry. If, in the 
heat of anger, and under the spur of what seemed to me great provo- 
cation, I have committed an act violating the proprieties of the House 
and offensive to its dignity, I desire to offer an humble apology. I 
yield to no man in respect for this House. I have been for six years 
a member of it ; I am, I think, at present, the oldest member; and, 
although Providence did not bless my early career with that culture 
which graces so many other gentlemen of the House, yet I have en- 
joyed the friendship of many members, and until recently the kindly 
acquaintance of them all. I do not seek to mitigate any proper censure 
that may be due to me, or to defend an act which I know was in viola- 
tion of the decorum necessary in all legislative bodies : yet I think it 



MEMORABLE DEADLOCK OF 187L ^1 

due to myself to say that the unfortunate altercation between the 
member from Clinton county and myself would never have occurred, 
had not his conduct toward me on that occasion, and for some time 
past, satisfied me of the existence of a settled desire on his part to 
irritate and insult me. I distinctly state that I was struck by the 
member from Clinton before I raised my hand against him. 

In conclusion, I thank the House with all my heart for the kindness 
with which I have been treated by it, and with no less earnestness and 
sincerity renew the assurance of my deep regret that any act of mine 
should have diminished that feeling or changed the relations we have 

borne toward each other. 

Respectfully, 

James Irving. 

Notwithstanding the receipt of this letter, the Special 
Committee was instructed by the House to continue the in- 
vestigation ordered; and the House determined that no 
other business should be transacted until the Committee re- 
ported. On April 11, the report was submitted, stating 
that the case had received full investigation, and conclud- 
ing as follows : 

" Mr. Irving having resigned his seat as a member of Assembly from 
the Fifteenth district of the county of New York, and no one having 
appeared against Mr. Weed, your Committee feel that they have dis- 
charged their duty, in reporting the testimony taken before the Com- 
mittee to the House, which report they have accompanied with the fol- 
lowing resolution : 

" Resolved, That in the judgment of this House, the conduct of Mr. 
Irving, late a member thereof, from the Fifteenth Assembly District in 
the county of New York, during its session of Friday, April 7, 1871, 
was a high breach of its privileges and the rights of its members ; and 
if he, Mr. Irving, had remained a member of this House, he would 
have deserved the severest punishment in its power to inflict." 

This report was adopted by a unanimous vote of the 
House ; and so ended the Irving episode. 

The Democracy were now, of course, powerless to pass a 
bill, having only sixty-four votes, and at least four or five 
important Kew York measures yet remained to be acted on, 
including the City Tax Levy ; which measures the Kadical 
press claimed to be of " a political character," and called 



282 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

upon tlie Republican members to unitedly oppose. " We 
can promise," said the Radical organ, at Albany, " any Re- 
publican who dares to place himself in opposition to his 
party, and in alliance with the Tammany Ring, such rich- 
ness of infamy as will make for him further political life in 
IS^ew York State impossible.' ' " From this hour," wrote 
Horace Greeley, in the Tribune, " until the adjournment of 
the Legislature, Republicans expect every representative 
they have in Albany to be at his post, sick or well, and to 
vote in unison with his party. Watch the man who on any 
excuse whatever votes with the Democrats, or fails to 
vote." 

In consequence of this attitude of the Republicans the 
Democratic camp was in a state of demoralization, and the 
situation was indeed embarrassing. There seemed to be 
only one way out, and that was to win over in some way 
one Republican, who could muster enough courage to 
face the scorn of his party leaders and party organs, defy 
their commands, and record his vote for the bills, " so 
necessary," as was claimed by the Democrats, " for the 
proper government of the metropolis." 

Then the air became rife with stories that Tweed liad 
determined to employ the lobby to remove " existing ob- 
structions." It was rumored that as high as from twenty- 
five to fifty thousand dollars had been suggested as the 
price that would be willingly paid for the service of a sin- 
gle additional vote on the Democratic side "for the re- 
mainder of the session.'- 

The Republican leaders then became alarmed and called 
a caucus of Senators and Assemblymen, and the deputy 
Bosses of the party (for Bosses are not confined to the 
Democracy) were summoned from all parts of the State. 
At this caucus it was decided that no Republican could, 
consistently with his party obligations, support the New 
York bills, known as the " Registry " bill, the " Election " 



A CRISIS AT THE STATE CAPITAL. 2S3 

bill, tlie " Two Per Cent." bill, or the bill to " Amend the 
Charter of the City of New York," then pending in the 
Legislature ; and the following resolution was adopted : 

" Resolved, That iu case any member of the party shall desert it, in 
acting upon the measures above referred to, we will regard it as our 
duty to denounce such deserter as a traitor to the party, in a writing 
to be signed by us, and published in the Republican papers of this State. 

"We the undersigned do hereby agree to abide by the foregoing 
resolution, and do hereby pledge ourselves solemnly, as members of 
the Republican party, to support the same." 

This resolution and agreement, approved in caucus^ signed 
by every Republican member of the Legislature, were pub- 
lished at once in the Republican newspapers of the State. 

Then the Democrats "• got their backs up." In the As- 
sembly, Thomas C. Fields, of New York city, made a ter- 
rific denunciation of this attempt of the Republicans to 
block legislation in the State, and declared that the only 
recourse left the Democracy w^as to retaliate, and, until the 
vacancy caused by the resignation of Mr. Irving was filled 
by a special election, to transact no business in the House ; 
and on his motion the House immediately adjourned. 
When the Senate assembled, it went into Committee of the 
Whole on the pending Canal bill. Senator Tweed almost 
immediately moved that the Committee rise, report prog- 
ress on the Bill and ask leave to sit again, adding : 

"I make this motion for the purpose of following it with another 
motion, when we get into regular session. I see in the Evening Journal 
newspaper that our friends on the other side have decided that this 
Legislature shall do no more business until certain matters are fixed to 
their satisfaction. In view of that decision on their part, we, the 
Democrats, have made up our minds that, until we know whether 
legislation is going to be impeded by the united action of the gentlemen 
on the other side, we do not care to pass this or any other bill. We 
wish to get together and consult, and ascertain, if possible, what our 
friends the Republicans mean. They seem to have acted in a way 
never before seen or heard of in a legislative body. Here are bills 
pending, involving great responsibilities — bills that it is necessary to 
pass in some form in order to carry on the government of great cities 



234 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

in our State ; yet, because an exigency has arisen, in consequence of a 
disgraceful episode in tlie Assembly Chamber over which we had no 
control, they get together and sign a paper stating that these bills are 
political bills, and that they will not even consider them or let them 
pass. It is in order that the Democrats of the Legislature may reflect 
and consult calmly upon this unexpected condition of things— in order 
that they may not be blinded by passion or prejudice, as I fear some of 
the gentlemen were who signed the Evening Journal manifesto— that, 
M'hen the Committee rises, I shall present my motion for an adjourn- 
ment of the Senate." 

After a few words of explanation from other Senators, 
the Committee rose, and the Senate adjourned, in accord- 
ance with Mr. Tweed's motion. 

At the caucus which was held, the Democrats determined 
to introduce a bill providing for a special election in the 
Fifteenth Assembly District in the County of New York, 
to till the vacancy caused by Mr. Irving's resignation ; and 
should the bill fail to pass, then to vote for a recess of the 
Legislature for a period of twenty days. In that event, to 
request the Governor to order a special election to fill such 
vacancy, and thus restore to the Democrats in the Assembly 
the voice and power to which they were of right entitled. 

In accordance with the recommendation of the caucus, a 
bill providing for a special election in the Fifteenth Assem- 
bly District of New York County was introduced in the 
House, and " rushed " through all the orders of legislation 
up to a third reading, at which stage it was declared lost, 
lacking one of the necessary sixty-five votes. The intro- 
ducer of the bill, Mr. Frear, of New York, then made the 
usual effort to save it, by moving to " reconsider the vote by 
which the bill was lost, and to lay that motion upon the 
table," which, being carried, the House took a recess till 
evening, and on assembling in the evening immediately ad- 
journed till the next morning ; and similar action was by 
agreement taken by the Senate. 

It was felt by everybody that a crisis had been reached, 
and that Tweed, who had overcome so many obstacles in 



REPUBLICAN LEADERS ARE ASTONISHED. 285 

his onward marcli to supreme power, would not permit him- 
self to be beaten now. He had said, when confronted by 
the rebellion of the Young Democracy, that he would 
win " if he had to step over hell to do so ; " and it was 
now confidently believed that he would break the existing 
'' dead-lock ;" but, how, when, or through whom, all was 
conjecture. Rumors had become so numerous, and sus- 
picions so rife, that the Eepublican leaders determined to 
call their forces again in caucus, in order to ascertain if the 
" Destroying Angel " had reappeared in Albany and had 
been hovering over their camp. At this caucus they liedged 
a little on their "blocking of legislation" game, and resolved, 
that, " while adhering firmly to the position we have already 
taken, we shall oppose any final adjournment of the Legis- 
lature till all proper and necessary measures are passed." 

Then the chairman of the caucus was authorized to send 
through the Associated Press an " All is well " midnight 
dispatch, to assure their brethren in other parts of the State 
that, as a party, their representatives at Albany were uncor- 
rupted and steadfast. The dispatch, as it appeared in lead- 
ing Republican organs, read as follows : 

" There is no change in the situation. The Eepublican members are 
firm and in high spirits. Their organization is stronger than could, 
have been conceived at this time last week. The Democrats are un- 
doubtedly holding ofE to buy some one, and if they fail in this they 
will probably give up all the other New York bills, get the best City 
Tax Levy bill they can, and adjourn as soon as possible. They were 
much disappointed that they did not pass their Special Election bill 
this evening, as they had calculated upon the services of a certain 
Republican member. The Republicans are astonished, under the cir- 
cumstances, to find themselves so strong ; and they deserve credit. 
There has been a wonderful improvement in the Republican atmosphere. 
Old members say they have seen nothing like it for many years." 

So often had rural Republican legislators fallen victims to 
the allurements of the Tempter that the " wonderful im- 
provement" referred to in the quoted dispatch, astonished 
many others beside the Republican leaders ; and, true it 



286 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

was, that old members had " seen nothing Hke it for many 
years." It was, nevertheless, also true that more than one 
pair of eager eyes had been turned toward " forbidden 
fruit"; but the potential voice of the united Republican 
press daily sounded in the ears of the " weak and way- 
ward " the certain destruction which would follow the eat- 
ing of "the ajDple " ; and hence some of their well-guarded 
flock were kept strong and virtuous " in spite of them- 
selves.'' Forty or fifty thousand dollars just to vote " aye" 
on three or four bills was a terrible temptation for poor, 
weak human nature. 

But, notwithstanding the " wonderful improvement in 
the Republican atmosphere," the "Destroying Angel" 
had not given uj3 the contest ; he was " still doing business 
at the old stand," 

On the third floor of the Delavan House, almost immedi- 
ately over the apartments occupied by Senator Tweed, 
roomed a Republican member of Assembly from Chautauqua 
county. He was a tall, fine-looking man, very gentlemanly 
in appearance, and altogether one of the most afi^able as 
as well as most noticeable members seated in the body to 
which he was attached. Being of a sociable turn, he had 
made an appointment to join a party on the floor below, 
that evening, in a game of cards. Not appeanng at the ap- 
pointed time, one of the party volunteered to go to his 
room and remind him of his engagement. Knocking at his 
door, and entering, upon invitation, the gentleman from 
Chautauqua was discovered seated at a round table playing 
a game of " solitaire," in which he seemed much absorbed ; 
and in reply to the message of his visitor, he begged to be 
excused, adding that he " had an engagement to discuss a 
matter of some importance, and he would have to forego 
the expected pleasure," etc., etc. 

His visitor departed, and the party below went on with 
their " little game," having no idea of the kind of a game 



SMASHING A RErUBLICAN CAUCUS. SSt 

that was going to be played on the upper floor, about the 
very time that the assuring and satisfactory dispatch 
reciting the "wonderful improvement in the Republican 
atmosphere " was being telegraphed for the benefit of Re- 
publican readers throughout the State. 

The session of the Assembly, on the morning of the 
fifteenth of April, was attended as usual by a full House. 
Every seat was filled except that which had so long been 
occupied by Mr. Irving. " What's going to be done ? " was 
the inquiry all around. But, as the Republicans had found 
everything so satisfactory at their caucus the evening before, 
ex-Governor Alvord, their leader on the floor of the House, 
was smiling and happy. " Everything's all right," was his 
genial reply to all interrogatories. 

There had been no prayers in the House for several 
days ; sessions had been irregular and the excitement had 
been too intense. But, this morning. Speaker Hitchman, 
rapping the assemblage to order, introduced a minister, 
who made a short prayer which breatlied the hope that 
"peace, love and unity" would thereafter characterize all 
the proceedings of the House. To which ex-Governor 
Alvord, the Republican leader, responded : " Amen ! " 

Mr. Alexander Frear, who was one of Tweed's lieuten- 
ants and chairman of the Committee on Cities, as soon 
as the order of business was called, reported the bill amend- 
ing the charter of the City of New York ; also the New 
York City Two Per Cent. Tax bill, and asked unanimous 
consent to go into Committee of the "Whole on these bills. 
Mr. Alvord said he had no desire to prevent action on the bills, 
but he suggested that they be made the special order for 
Monday, the l7th inst., and insisted that they should not 
be advanced to the prejudice of other bills of equal im- 
portance to members. He would, therefore, object to 
granting the consent asked, and would move that the bills 
be printed and made the special order for Monday evening. 



388 THIRTY Years of new york politics. 

" No, no ! " went up from the Democratic members ; " no 
more monkeying ! " Mr. Fields, of New York, demanded 
the "previous question." Upon this the ayes and nays 
were called, and the vote went on. As each Republican 
voted "no " the eyes of the " Onondaga Chief," as old ex- 
Governor Alvord was called, glistened ; and he had just 
moved around in his seat, satisfied that his flock was all safe 
— that " the wonderful improvement in the Republican 
atmosphere " was all there, when, upon the name of 
Mr. Orange S. Winans, of Dunkirk, Chautauqua County, 
being called, that gentleman rose and " asked to be 
excused from voting, and would give his reasons." Even 
then there was no fear on the Republican side ; they 
felt themselves " so strong," as the midnight dispatch had 
stated. But as the first sentence fell upon their horrified 
ears, the Republican side of the House realized that they 
were "gone up in a balloon." Mr. Winans said that his 
name had been used in connection with the Republican 
caucus resolution without his authority. He further said 
that he " acknowledged that the Democracy here were en- 
titled to a constitutional majority," and he " would there- 
after vote with them every time." 

This speech of Mr. Winans elicited applause from the 
Democrats, because of the victory now within their grasp ; 
but loud exclamations of " Shame ! " " Sold out ! " " Trai- 
tor ! " etc., etc., came from the Republicans. Members 
arose from their seats, and there was a rush of Republicans 
toward the doors, as if about to retire in disgust But Mr. 
Alvord begged them to " return and stand by their guns," 
which they did. The " previous question " was then decided 
carried ; and of course the deadlock was ended. With a 
constitutional majority in their favor the Democrats had 
plain sailing thereafter. Among other bills passed was 
that providing for a Special Election in the Fifteenth As- 
sembly District in New York; after which the House ad- 



WOKK OF THE "DESTROYING ANGEL." 289 

journed to Monday evening. Before the close of another 
week all business of importance before the Legislature was 
concluded, and both Houses adjourned sine die. 

Severest denunciation was, of course, meted out to Mr. 
Winans by the Republican press. Horace Greeley, in the 
Trihune of Monday, April 17, 1871, in addition to a scath- 
ing leading article against " the traitor," published the fol- 
lowing, in conspicuous type, on the editorial page of that 
paper : 

"For Sale or To Let for Business Purposes — a Member of Assembly. 
Rent, for the season, $100,000, or will be sold cheap for cash. Posses- 
sion as soon as the Tax Levy and Election bills are passed , the present 
lessee having no further use for the property. Inquire of Wm. M. 
Tweed, Albany, or O. S. Winans, on the premises. 

It is said that this proceeding on the part of Mr. "Winans 
brought, not only disgrace, but absolute ruin to him. His 
father-in-law, a staunch Republican, denounced him in un- 
measured terms at his home, and prevailed upon his daughter 
(Winans' wife) to separate from him. His neighbors would 
not notice him ; and he was actually driven out of his place 
of residence by the contempt and scorn of his townsmen. 
It is believed that, realizing his disgraced position, he took 
to drinking, and committed suicide, like Judas of old ; 
though there is a rumor that he is still alive, but leading 
the life of a besotted tramp, in one of the Western States. 

Whatever may be said in condemnation of Tweed and 
of the venal member from Chautauqua County whom he 
evidently purchased, their crimes, great as they were, can- 
not compare in enormity with the crime of the Republican 
members in disfranchising the people of the 15th Assembly 
District of ISTew York County for base and partisan pur- 
poses. By the resignation of Irving the people of that 
district were left without representation in the popular 
branch of the Legislature. That they were entitled to it 
under the Constitution was clear. The Republicans, in 
refusing to permit a bill to pass to fill the existing vacancy 



290 THIRTY YEARS OF MEW YORK POLITICS. 

by popular vote, denied representation to a political entity 
of the State, and committed an assault on the Constitution 
itself. Theh"s, therefore, was a crime more heinous than 
that of either Tweed or his miserable hireling, and when 
the Republican leaders inside and outside of the Legislature 
so virtuously denounced Winans as a traitor, they seemed 
to forget, in their chagrin, that he was not half as traitorous 
as they were, because they were traitors to the Constitu- 
tion. 

While, of course, nothing can be said to excuse Tweed, 
there may be something advanced in extenuation of his 
act, in view of the high-handed and conscienceless conduct 
of his Republican confreres, who had voted in caucus, 
as well as in the Legislature, to deprive a whole community 
of legal and constitutional rights. 

I trust, my dear Dean, that you will not, after perusing 
this letter, and having read the peculiar methods of legisla- 
tion which I have chronicled in previous letters, imagine 
for a moment that such incidents or such practices are com- 
mon occurences in our State Legislature. On the (jontrary, 
never before in the annals of our State, or at least not since 
the days of Callicot (who once deserted his party to be 
made Speaker of the House) has such degradation as that 
evidenced by the unfortunate Winans been known ; and 
rare indeed have been such displays of lobbying as cliarac- 
terized the Erie Railway contest, to which I have alluded. 
In the popular branch of our Legislature have appeared from 
time to time some of the very best men this State has pro- 
duced. Samuel J. Tilden, Horatio Seymour, David B. Hill, 
Silas Wright, John A. Dix, and Wm. H. Seward, all of 
whom became Governors of the State, and several of whom 
filled high positions under the Federal Government, saw 
service in the Assembly ; while Chief Justice Sanford 
E. Church, Millard Fillmore, (President of the United 
States), Chauncey M. Depew, (United States Senator.) Henry 



NOT ALL " BLACK SHEEP." 291 

C. Murphy, (Minister to the Netherlands,) as well as Sec- 
retary of the Treasury Charles J. Folger (previously al- 
luded to) were also graduates of our State Legislature. In 
the Church, at the Bar, in the Legislature, as well as in 
every condition of life, there are " black sheep," but they 
are the exception, not the rule, in our State Capitol. In- 
deed, in my experience as a Legislator and otherwise, never 
was a member of either branch of that body suspected of 
descending from his high estate to that of a creature of the 
lobby, who was not avoided and despised by all honorable 
men. Conscientious members always strive to avoid the 
presence of the professional lobbyists, who have the un- 
blushing impudence to claim as " one of their men," and 
trade upon the name of, every member with whom they 
happen to be on speaking terms. 



LETTER XXVI. 

A Civil Justice in the Halcyon Days op the Ring— The 
Give-and-Take System op Political Advancement — Suc- 
cess OF Cheek and Log-Rolling — How a Sample Civil 
Justice Opened His Court — Enthusiastic Admirers Pro- 
foundly Affected by His Inaugural Speech — Cunning 
Attempts to Make Political Capital — Deciding a Ques- 
tion of Law by Knock-Down Argument — Futile Effort 
to Crush a Young Advocate — The Judge on the Bench 
Offers to Bet on a Sure Thing. 

My dear Dean : 

Many people living in the City of New York at the 
present day are often entertained, at select social gather- 
ings, with humorous anecdotes descriptive of the charac- 
teristics of Judges who had seats on the Bench, in the lower 
Courts, in the days of Tweed, and who reached judicial 
elevation by the one-man power in politics. 

It may be naturally asked why persons not qualified by 
education and training were chosen for these public duties, 
in view of the fact that the compensation was liberal, being 
then $6,000 per annum, and when so many lawyers of aver- 
age ability were ready and anxious to fill these positions, 
especially as they would not thereby be restricted from prac 
tising their profession. It is not easy to understand why the 
leaders, particularly a leader like Tweed, who, as a rule, was 
sagacious enough to surround himself with men of standing 
and ability in choosing the Heads of Departments, should 
have selected such indifferent material for Judges of these 
lower Courts. But the explanation is this : the most im- 
portant source of the Ring's power was in the higher Courts, 
the Board of Supervisors, the Common Council, the Board 

293 



THE USE OF POLICE JUSTICES. 293 

of Audit, the Heads of Departments, and last though not 
least in the State Legislature. The office of Police Justice 
was also of considerable political importance, as an aid as 
well as a menace in the management of primary and general 
elections ; for, by the machinery of the Police Courts, the 
rough element was kept in line, in a hundred ways, for the 
organization controlled by the King. These Magistrates 
were appointed by the Mayor, and Tweed always saw to it 
that serviceable men were chosen. 

The position of Civil Justice of a local or district Court, 
however, was comparatively of minor importance, in a 
political sense. There was some patronage attached to his 
Court, such as clerks, stenographer, interpreter and Court 
officers, and to that extent the office was of more or less 
consequence. The nominees for these offices were selected 
generally by the local leaders, who made combinations for 
other nominations, such as for Kepresentatives in Congress^ 
State Senators, Assemblymen and Aldermen, with other 
local leaders. The Judicial districts embraced several 
Wards, so did the Senatorial districts, and so did the Con- 
gressional districts; but not all covering the same terri- 
tory exactly, but for the most part so. It was a system 
of give and take, among these local leaders. The Boss-in- 
chief always looked out for the kind of men who were 
to go to the State Legislature, and when he had his men 
secured without friction for these positions, it was easy to 
satisfy him in the local choice for Civil Justice. So that, 
when some Ward politician got together a number of friends 
in his favor for Civil Justice, the candidates for the other 
offices, in order to secure the support of this faction for 
nomination to the offices they aspired to, were ready to con- 
sent to the nomination of the candidate for Civil Justice 
who had most of the "gang" behind him, without the 
slightest regard to his qualifications. The "slate" being 
agreed upon by the local Bosses, there was little danger of 



294 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the Boss-in-cliief upsetting it on account of a mere Civil 
Justice, so long as he had his own men for the Senate and 
Assembly. 

In addition to the patronage above referred to, the Civil 
Justices had a chance to do favors in landlord and tenant pro- 
ceedings ; but the difficulty here was that, if the Judge favored 
the tenant, the landlord was angry, and vice versa. But as 
the Judge was well-acquainted within his district, he was 
able to determine nearly always what was " the right thing to 
do," in measuring tlie political effect of his decisions. When 
the landlord was a politician, or mixed in politics, and 
the tenant wanted a few days to pay the rent, or to move 
from the premises, the Justice in such case always left it to 
the discretion or forbearance, or humanity, or whatever it 
may be called, of the landlord, as to whether the warrant 
of dispossess should or should not issue forthwith. If, on 
the other hand, the landlord was a nobody, and the tenant 
a person of influence in politics, and especially if he had 
several votes in his family, then the Judge became ex- 
tremely humane, and often read a mild lecture to the land- 
lord on the misfortunes of poverty and the virtue of 
generosity and kindness, and generally induced the landlord 
to relax his severity and give the tenant another chance to 
pay, or allow him several days to obtain new quarters. 

The difficulty of determining actions for debt between 
liis neighbors was not quite such an easy task. It often 
happened that disputes arose between the residents of a 
Judge's district, involving claims for money loaned, for 
wages, or on accounts for household necessaries, or for 
material furnished, and a hundred and one things which 
break personal friendships and bring on legal warfare 
among neighbors. In many instances, it was not the 
amount involved that the litigants so much cared about- 
Many a man had a falling-out with his neighbor, which brought 
their respective families, including not only their wives and 



THE DILEMMA OF CIVIL JUSTICES. 295 

children, but their relations on both sides into violent 
antagonism, over an amonnt which lie would not hesitate 
to spend in a drinking saloon in one night. Thoroughly 
". '^amed towards each other, both factions rushed to Court, 
ith claims and counter-claims. Not onlj did the litigants 
and their families attend the trial, but many of the friends 
and adherents of the contending parties " took a day off " 
to show their sympathy, and perliaps to prove their " pull " 
with the Judge. Each of the factions may have worked 
hard for him during the election, and each may have a 
strong local following which must be reckoned with in 
future elections. These are delicate — indeed, I might say 
perilous,— -moments for a Judge whose political necessities 
require that he should conciliate both sides. Willingly 
would he pay twice the amount involved, out of his own 
pocket, to avoid determining which side was right, or, what 
was more to be dreaded, which side was wrong. 

A Judge sometimes, to escape this dilemma, procured a 
Judge from another district — who was outside the local 
political influences of the litigants — to sit in his Court and 
try these troublesome cases, while his own absence was ex- 
plained by alleged sickness, or absence from the City on 
business ; but this device was easily seen through, and only 
made him enemies on both sides, (each side being certain 
it had him,) and after a while, Judges concluded that 
running away from such cases was " bad politics," and should 
not be resorted to. 

The nomination of Gus Heberman, for Civil Justice of 
the District Court, was brought about by the log-rolling 
which I have described above. Heberman, in his early days, 
was a fishmonger. He had a strong voice and a stronger 
face. It might be termed a corrugated face. He obtained 
some education in the public schools, which, to his credit be 
it said, he made good use of. Residing in the midst of a 
German district, his aggressive manner and quickness of re- 



290 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

tort made liini known, and to a certain extent feared, among 
his own people. Again, many of them felt proud of him, 
because he could hold his own in a discussion with nnv 
ordinary politician. In this way, he gradually arose 
political prominence. By means of influences mentione '!: 
a previous letter, he became a member of the New 1 oiK 
Bar. At the next available opportunity, he pushed aheaci 
boldly and determinedly for the nomination for Civil 
Justice. AVhen he first proposed it, his hearers listened in 
silence and smiled. He felt his w^ay with some who were 
prominent in local politics, throwing out the suggestion 
that certain friends of his had been mentioning his name 
for the office, but those he addressed changed the subject of 
conversation at the first chance. Finding this chilly recep- 
tion among the politicians, Heberman went to his old com- 
panions, and by promises of friendly returns, when it came 
his way, enlisted them in his cause. It was not long before 
an organization was formed in his interest. As the time 
for nomination drew near, he exhibited such strength that 
it would have been dangerous for other local candidates to 
oppose him, and by obtaining a promise here and the with- 
drawal of opposition there, Gus Heberman was nominated 
for Judge of the — th District Court. Having the 
Tammany nomination, he was elected — the district being 
Democratic by a safe majority. No man ever ascended the 
Judicial Bench with more apparent ease and complacency 
than Gus. Heberman. He acted as if he were " to the man- 
ner born." Had he been a graduate of a University, and a 
practicing lawyer for a quarter of a century, he could not 
have assumed the judicial attitude and dignity with more 
sang f raid. 

The formal openinj^ of Court on the second day of Janu- 
ary (New Year's day is kept as a holiday here) was a local 
event of great importance to the friends and supporters of 
Heberman. To think that their old chum and fellow 



TAKING HIS SEAT ON THE BENCH. 297 

• 

" rounder " should sit with gravity- and solemnity on the 
Bench, as* a Judge administering the law, of which he knew 
so little, and for which he always cared so little, w^as to 
keep them in a state of mental balancing between serious- 
ness and merriment. As might be expected, under such 
circumstances, the Court-room was crowded long before 
the hour of nine o'clock, when the Judge was expected to 
assume the functions of his office. At precisely three min- 
utes past nine o'clock, Judge Heberman was struggling up 
stairs to the Court-room, which was on the second floor of 
the building. His passage through the throng of people in 
the corridors and on the stairways was difficult, because the 
Judge was stout and very wide, and in order to make his way 
with more effectiveness, he was obliged to turn his body 
and go sideways, using his left shoulder as a wedge. Then 
his progress was further interrupted by enthusiastic ad- 
mirers rushing towards him and shaking his hands, in some 
instances delaying him just a moment to whisper something 
important in his ear, to which the Judge invariably nodded, 
and said " All right." Some ill-mannered persons, possibly 
to show their own importance, greeted him with " Hullo, 
Gus," at which familiarity, however, he outwardly took no 
offense ; but his face, grave and flushed, put on no smile in 
response. As he reached the Court-room, the newly-ap- 
pointed Court officers, eagerly watching for his arrival, 
made a violent rush to force a passage-way through the 
crowd. They regarded neither friend nor foe in the per- 
formance of this duty, but shoved the people aside with 
both hands moving as if they were swimming. At last, 
the Judge reached the Bench, which he ascended slowly 
and with great dignity. He surveyed the audience just for 
a moment, before he took his seat. It was apparent there 
was something on his mind. His face was very red, per- 
haps from the exertion of elbowing the crowd, or maybe 
from the effects of New Year's day ; but, while flushed to 



298 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

a scarlet hue, it looked serious and troubled. After the 
formal opening of the Court, the Judge took the judicial 
gavel, and gave three distinct knocks, presumably to call 
for order; but there was really no necessity fortius, for 
the assemblage was hushed into absolute silence, while wit- 
nessing, with intense interest, the Judge's first ascent to the 
Bench. A moment's pause. Then, doubtless, for the 
meritorious purpose of making a good impression at the 
start, the Judge delivered himself of the following 
inaugural, with impressive dignity : 

" In opening this Court, it is my pleasure to greet my friends and to 
say to them, and to the public at large, that I thank them one and all 
for their friendship and support in placing me on this high elevation." 

He then glanced hastily at a paper before him on the 
Bench on which his speech was written and proceeded : 

" In times of war soldiers dig down deep within or near the camp 
and construct artisan wells [it was "artesian" wells in the paper] and draw 
pure water from the bowels of the earth to refresh them, and so I shall 
dig far and deep, and to the very bottom, in the trials before me and 
draw forth the hidden waters of truth to refresh the ends of Justice." 

After this powerful figure in hydraulics, if not in rhetoric, 

the Judge, taking another glance at the paper, concluded 

as follows : 

"In the deepest gratitude for your confidence I can only recompense 
you by promising, which I now do most solemnly, that while I have 
the honor of occupying this seat of Justice, I shall be neither partial 
nor impartial, in the discharge of my duties." 

[ This sapient utterance, delivered in a strong voice, and 
with almost frowning countenance, had a profound effect 
upon his liearers, many of whom nodded their heads in ap- 
proval of the exalted purposes of the new Judge. 

One of the weaknesses of Judge Ileberman was that he 
greatly hankered after popularity, and he had, to tell the 
truth, for some time succeeded in his efforts. But popu- 
larity, that bewitching siren, is very fickle. 

JTpw, as a method of obtaining and maintaining hi§ 



HOW A JUDGE LOST POPULARITY. 299 

popularity, tlie Judge was in the habit, whenever any 
prominent citizen, who had supported him in the recent 
election, came into Court, such as a prosperous liquor dealer 
or the head of some manufacturing concern, of inviting him 
on the Bench, under the pretence of talking to him on some 
business, but in reality for the sole purpose of conferring a 
special honor upon him. Keeping his eyes on the examin- 
ing counsel or the witness, during the progress of a case, 
he would lean back in his chair, his left ear inclined to- 
ward his guest on the Bench, with whom he occasionally 
chatted. All this, in addition to honoring the citizen, 
served the purpose of showing with what perfect ease Gus. 
ileberman could discharge duties that have made even old 
law^'ers in the same station look anxious and troubled. At 
first, these honors conferred on influential citizens were ap- 
preciated by the recipients. But the Judge, after all, did 
not understand human nature. For, in the course of time, 
he had invited so many to participate in this distinction, 
that those who were first honored naturally regarded such 
an invitation as no honor at all, Nay, more, the Judge, in 
his thoughtless selections, invited not only enemies of 
many of those whom he had thus favored previously, but 
he extended this extraordinary courtesy to persons who 
were regarded as disreputable in the community. 

The honor, therefore, became greatly cheapened, and the 
Judge's political standing began to suffer in consequence, al- 
though he did not know it. Then those who were first invit- 
ed, and who really ought to have been grateful, because they 
had received the distinction when it was of value, besran to 
hint that the whole matter was a device of the Judge to use 
influential men as playthings in a little political game of 
his own ; so that, towards the end of his term, his scheme, 
instead of adding to his popularity, resulted in an outspoken 
hostility which defeated his re-nomination for a second 
teriii. 



800 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

In the early part of his judicial career, on an occasion 
when some distinguished citizen was by his side upon the 
Bench, chatting with him, the case of Brown against Lane 
was called. Lane, the defendant, was a man of considerable 
influence in the Judge's district, and was besides his per- 
sonal friend. It can hardly be denied that Lane had spoken 
to the Judge of the case in advance, because, as soon as the 
case was called, the Judge excused himself to the distin- 
guished citizen, and sat up erect. He was at once on the 
qui vive. Lane, secure in the Judge's friendship, employed 
no lawyer. Brown, on the other hand, employed Mr. 
Henry Johnson, a young fledgling of the law, a near rela- 
tive, who had bean only admitted to the Bar the preceding 
terra. Mr. Johnson was very youthful in appearance and 
timid of manner. He called Mr. Brown to the witness 
stand to prove the plaintiif's case. He asked him what his 
name was, where he resided, and if he were the plaintiff in 
the case. This went on smoothly ; but, on asking the next 
question, the Judge, looking severely at Mr. Johnson, and 
extending his hand towards him, said, in a firm tone : 
" Young man, you can't ask no such question in this 
Court." Mr. Johnson, greatly disconcerted by the manner 
and emphasis of the Judge, stopped and gazed for a mo- 
ment into vacancy, but quickly recovering himself, and 
concluding that the Judge objected merely to the form of 
the question, put substantially the same question, but in a 
modified form ; whereupon the Judge, raising his voice 
louder than before, said : " Young man, I have told you 
that you can't ask no such question in this Court," which 
was as much as to say that, in every other Court on earth, 
it might be right, but not in " this Court." Still, believ- 
ing that only the form of the question was objected to by 
the Judge, Mr. Johnson now made a radical alteration in 
it, and in this new form put the question to the witness. 
The Judge quickly bent forward, looking severely, and 



'aQ 




A KNOCK-DOWN CONCESSION. 801 

said, pointin<; liis ft)refinger at "^^r. .lolin.soii : " How often 
liave I to tell you that you cairt aslc no suc-li (jucstion in 
this Court ? " '' Why, your Honor," said Mr. Johnson, " if 
I can't ask sucli a (|uesti()ii, I can ask no (juestion at all. 
The question is as to the iiiception of the claini." llavino; 
been roused up, Mr. Johnson, who, notwithstandin'j: his 
timidity, had latent talents, proceeded with a victor that 
astonished his hearers : " How can a case be laid before 
the Court by a plaintiff," he asked, " if he is not permitted 
to state the foundation and the nature of the negotiation 
on which his claim is based V On, in this line, Mr. John- 
son proceeded, during which it was easy to notice that the 
mombers of the Bar, who sat in Court, agreed and sympa- 
thized with him. This the Judge noticed, too, and as Mr. 
Johnson went on, now standing erect and thoroughly waked 
u[), the Judge, conscious that his crushing process did not 
work, shifted uneasily in his seat from side to side, and at 
last, unable to stand the strain any h)nger, suddenly darted 
his right hand towards the lawyer and im])ulsively blurted 
out : " Hold on, young man ! You can go on and ask the. 
(piestion ; but I bet you ten dollars you'll lose your case ! " 



Letter xxyii. 

Three Very Remarkable Men— Mike Walsh, Capt. Isaiah 
Rynders and Count Joannes— The Spartan Band and 
THE Empire Club— Mike's Election Squabble with John 
Kelly— His Arrest tor Criminal Libel— How He 
Offended His Friend Broderick by Not Committing 
Suicide— Capt. Rynders' Democratic Speech on Horse- 
back TO a Defeated Whig Nominee— His Goodness of 
Heart and Kindly Act to Isaac V. Fowler, New York's 
Democratic Postmaster, When in Trouble— Count 
Joannes, a Man op Trials— Always in Hot Water. 

My dear Dean : 

Having in two or three preceding letters referred to 
picturesque people of the period of which I write, I may, 
while the subject is in my mind, also say something of 
three notable individuals who figured somewhat conspic- 
uously before the public. 

Of all the singular and eccentric men who "found a 
local habitation and a name " in New York, I doubt if 
there ever was a more peculiar, popular, brilliant, and yet, 
on the whole, a more impracticable creature than Michael 
Walsh, who always, however, signed his name " Mike " 
Walsh. An obituary of him contains these words : " No- 
body exactly understood him; he did not understand 
himself. Spite of his undeniable ability, nobody highly 
respected him ; and, spite of his many errors, everybody 
liked him." 

Mike Walsh was born at Youghal, Ireland, on March 7, 
1810, and was brought, when about two years old, to Balti- 
more, Maryland, by his father, who was a graduate of 
Trinity College, Dublin. Mike early developed a great 
fondness for books, and was a thoroughly well-educated 



302 



MIKi: ^VALS1I PUNCTURES A HUMBUG. 303 

man ; yet lie sceiiu'cl to lia\e ;i fondness for imd talked 
slang like any tramp wlio liad graduated in the gutter. 
But, then, Mike's slang was striking and original — such 
slang or argot as Victor Hugo would have liked. Mike 
Walsh is credited with the introduction of tlie expression 
" too thin," which has since passed into conunon use, and 
also with the parentage of "everything is lovely and the 
goose haugs high." And he was the originator of more 
practical jokes than any other man of his time. Indeed, 
Mike was always ready for a joke, no matter what the 
occasion. He didn't like " frills " in anybody, and always 
tried to take the starch out of any airy chap ; and he gen- 
erally succeeded in so doing. Once a man he didn't like, 
an ex-hotel proprietor, went into politics and got a nomina- 
tion for office ; and he rose to make his maiden speech a 
few nights afterwards. For some reason or other, the ex- 
hotel proprietor wanted to ignore the fact that he ever 
kept a tavern, and desired to figure as a born statesman. 
Mike had been advised of the man's pomposity, and he 
determined to raise a laugh on him, at the first opportunity. 
So he got as near as possible to the ex-hotel man, when 
the latter rose to make his speech, and pretended to be 
listening to it intently. But, at every pause in the speech, 
Mike would call out, in his deep bass voice, loud enough 
to be heard by all around him, the ex hotel man included, 
"John, a ]iitcher of ice-water to No. 25," or " Bichard, 
answer the bell of the gentleman in 129," or something of 
that kind, connected with hotel routine, completely taking 
the stirch out of the speaker, keeping the audience in a 
titter, and bringing the speech to an untimely end. 

During his career, Mike Walsh was pitted for awhile 
against another odd character, Capt. Isaiah Bynders. 
Walsh and Bynders were very differeiit men — Bynders be- 
ing as practical and persistent as Walsh was the reverse ; 
but both of them were alike eager for political notoriety. 



S04 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

So, when Kynders had got his Empire Chib started in the 
metropolis, Walsh, not to be outdone, started his Spartan 
Band. Of all names that Mike could have chosen for his 
" band " or club, " Spartan " was about the furthest re- 
moved from its real character. Mike himself was just the 
opposite of a Spartan. He liked his ease, and liked his 
creature comforts ; did not like hardship or sacrifice at all ; 
and most of his Spartans were just like him. It was the 
greatest lot of Spartans ever got together. Most of thepi 
were Irish Spartans, with French names, and hailing from 
the East side of the city. Still this highly miscellaneous 
and erratic Spartan Band was quite a power in local politics 
for several years, though in influence it never equalled that 
of its rival, the Empire Club. 

Mike Walsh was also an antagonist, and a formidable 
one, of John Kelly, whose pull in New York politics was, 
at the time referred to, not nearly so strong as that of Mike 
Walsh ; and had the latter taken any sort of care of him- 
self, he miglit have become much more prominent, as a 
political leader. As it was, he once canje within an ace of 
beating John Kelly in an election for Representative in 
Congress from New York City. The " Soft Shells," as 
they were styled, nominated Walsh, and the " Hard Shells" 
nominated Kelly. The contest was very bitter and very 
close, and finally Kelly came out ahead by only eighteen 
votes. There were charges that, owing to certain "irreg- 
ularities" in the Fourteenth Ward, John Kelly's votes 
were unlawfully increased ; and Mike Walsh began to in- 
stitute the necessary proceedings to contest the seat of 
Kelly. But, at this stage of the game, Kelly turned the 
tables on Walsh, procuring a statement from a man named 
Griffin that neither Mike Walsh nor his father was born in 
the United States, and that neither had taken out the neces- 
sary papers to become citizens. Whether the charge was 
true or false, Kelly's threat to use this Grifiin paper seemed 



SIIRINKINC FROM MARTYRDOM. 305 

to have stopped all further procecaings on the part of 
Walsh, who had previously served two years as Represen- 
tative in Congress, and was in such high favc.r at Washing- 
ton as to be chosen by Secretary of State Marcy as confi- 
dential ai^ont to England and ^Mexico. 

Mike Walsh also" figured for a while as an editor, having 
had some experience in a printing-otfice, and ran a weekly 
p-iper called " The Subterranean." Like Mike's own talk, 
his i)aner was erratic, sensational and the terror of J^olitical 
charlatans. xVs long as he confined himself to -speckled 
politicians," he got along all right, for he was a keen sat- 
irist and crenerallv hit his .nark; but, after a while, he 
made the mistake of '' pitching into " private individuals, 
and was arrested for criminal libel found guilty, and sent 
to the Penitentiary on Blackweirs Island. In this emer- 
gencv Mike's friends rallied around him; among others, 
David C. Broderick, then a rising Kew York politician, 
who looked upon Mike Walsh as the victim of a conspii-acy, 
and who went so far as to try and induce Walsh to make a 
first-class martyr of himself. 

Broderick, after the sentence to the Penitentiary, had a 
private interview with Mike, and urged him to commit 
suicide, and thus show the world that " he preferred death 
to diso-race," and all that. He tried to induce Mike to 
prove'^himself a worthy leader of a Spartan Band. But 
Mike did not embrace the opportunity. He preferred 
life-even life on the "Island "-to death, and determined 
to remain in the world, and bear its ills, rather than fly to 
others he knew not of. But, to please his friend Broder- 
ick he did promise to throw himself into the waters of the 
East River, on the way over to the Penitentiary; and as 
they parted, Mike Walsh bade Dave Broderick a long and 

last adieu. „ . , t) j 

"Hero! patriot! martyr! farewell forever," said Brod- 
erick, then in tlie enthusiastic stage of his political career, 



S06 THlRtY TEAKS OF NEW YoKK: POLITICS. 

as lie wrung Mike's hand fervently. " I will remain be- 
hind to see that posterity does you justice." 

Mike Walsh, in his heart, resolved to " remain behind " 
also, in order to assist in doing justice to himself, but held 
his peace. Broderick, however, went away and told his 
friends that Mike had " lived a patriot and would die a 
martyr," and solemnly assured them that the big-hearted, 
high-spirited WaTsh would never be able to endure the de- 
grading punishment to which he had been so unjustly con- 
demned, to the eternal disgrace of New York. Then 
Broderick would look "unutterable things" and darkly 
hint at the impending calamity. But no catastrophe took 
place. It is true that Walsh jumped off the ferry-boat which 
was taking him to the " Island ; " but he jumped off trying 
to escape, and was only too glad to be saved from drowning, 
and brought to life and the Penitentiary. There was nothing 
of the hero, the patriot, the martyr, or the Spartan about all 
this, and Broderick was disgusted. From the time Mike 
Walsh left the Penitentiary, after serving his term, to the 
day of his death, Dave C. Broderick never forgave his once 
associate and idol for so deceiving him. And yet Mike's 
only offense was that he had not killed himself to please a 
friend. 

If Mike Walsh had only made some practical use of the 
life he refused to take ! But he did not. George Steers, 
the great ship-builder, took a fancy to him — probably be- 
cause Mike was in every respect the precise opposite of 
himself — and gave him a splendid chance to get rich, while 
benefiting his country and serving his employer. Steers, 
who had won renown as the builder of the fast sailing win- 
ner of the International yacht race, the " America," was 
then trying to get a big contract from the Russian officials 
to build fast ships for their navy ; and he conceived the 
idea that Mike Walsh was the very man to go abroad as his 
agent, and " talk him up " to the Russian government ; for 



CAPTAIN RYNDERS, PKKSIDENT-MAKKR. 



'M 



Mike ^^as a good talker, had before l.een on diplomatic 
missions, and was very impressive in his conversation. So 
1,0 n-avc Walsh ample money, and procured for liim letters 
from the Secretary of the Navy at Washington ai.d prom- 
inent busine.^s men in New York, and promised him a lib- 
(M-d percentacre, if he got the contract through. Some men 
would haveldven ten years of life for Mike Walsh's 
chance; but, like everything else except his mere animal 
life, he threw it awav. He did not even go to Russia. He 
simply went on a big drunk all over Europe, and then, 
havincr spent all his monev, came back to New 1 ork as a 
steerage passenger, broken down in health, a mere wreck 
of hisliormer self; and one morning he was found dead in 
tlie area of a public house he had been visiting the night 
before Such was the end of Mike Walsh, who was gitted 
with the ability to make himself one of the most prom- 
inent men of his time ; but, lucking self-control, he proved 
a dead failure. He left behind a volume of his " Speeches, 
Poems and other Writings." 

Captain Isaiah Rynders, as 1 have before stated, was an 
entirely different sort of man from Mike Walsh. Besides 
being level-headed, he was practical, persevering and per- 
sistent, and before the era of Bossism, no politician in the 
metropolis exercised- more power, or commanded greater 
influence. He had one weak spot, if it was a weak spot, 
and that was his belief that he " had elected James K. Polk 
to the Presidency of the United States." The way it hap 
pened was as follows : In the Democratic National Con- 
vention assembled at Baltimore, in 18^4, Martin Van Buren 
of New York was figuring through his friends for the 
nomination, and was a general favorite with the Northern 
delegates; while John C. Calhoun was the choice of most 
of the Southern delegates. Calhoun was too much a pro- 
slavery man to satisfy the Northerners, and Van Buren was 
regarded as too much of a "dough-face" to please the 



308 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Southerners; but he was so "slj" a man that there was 
danger of his being nominated on a majority vote, which 
the Southerners did not want, so they log-rolled a new 
rule for the government of the Convention — that the nomi- 
nee " must receive a two-thirds vote." This action, of 
course, effectually squelched the possibilities of Calhoun, it' 
he had any worth speaking of, but it also positively de- 
stroyed the hopes of Van Buren, whose friends, upon dis- 
covering that his " cake was all dough," sought to make a 
nominee of Silas Wright, then a Senator from the State 
of New York. Morse's electric telegraph was then a new 
invention, and the people did not seem to place much re- 
liance upon it. It had to bemused on this occasion, to 
ascertain whether Mr. Wright, who was at his home in 
the interior of this State, would accept the proposed honor; 
and it was not long before he sent a telegram in reply, 
forbidding the use of his name in connection with the 
Presidency. This dispatch and answer were a splendid 
advertisement for the electric telegraph, and established it 
on a firm basis with the people. In the midst of the per- 
plexity which prevailed in the Convention regarding the 
choice of a nominee, Capt. Rynders suggested as a good 
compromise candidate — as between the North and South 
— his friend Congressman James K. Polk, of Tennessee, 
on the ground that because he was comparatively unknown 
and could not be accused of especially favoring either sec- 
tion of the Union he would make a most available nominee. 
Besides this, Mr. Polk had just written a letter in favor of 
the annexation of Texas to the Union, then a very popular 
demand of the people. The suggestion made by Rynders 
seemed to take root at once, and upon the re-assembling of 
the Convention after a recess, during which Mr. Polk was 
communicated with, that gentleman was nominated for 
President, with George M. Dallas, of Pennsylvania, for 
Vice-President. 



SERENA DF.I), BUT N< »T KIJ'X.TKD. 309 

Tliis incident was the basis of the Captain's boast, to 
whicii I have referred; and so ]>roud was lie of his achieve- 
ment tiiat, upon his return to New York, he immediately 
set to work to establish the Empire Club, and uiost vigor- 
ously and heartily entered into the Polk and Dallas cam- 
paigi^. Funnily enoui»;h, it so ha|i])ened that the very first 
undertaking of the Empire Club was a dead failure. It 
was after midnight when the Club was fully organized, 
and the members in a body started out for " a drink all 
around," at the expense of its leader, Capt. Rynders. They 
went to Windust's restaurant and hotel on Park Kow, and 
tried to raid that establishment. But Windust got alarmed 
at the immense crowd seeking admittance at that late liour, 
and instructed his attendant to lock the doors. Then the 
thirsty Empire Club marched up Broadway to Florence's 
saloon, on the corner of Leonard Street. But the proprietor 
closed that place too, fearing trouble. So the club was 
obliged to disperse without a drink — as a club — though no 
doubt the individual members picked up a " night-cap " or 
two on their way home. 

One of the best speeches Rynders ever made to the 
Empire Club was on the memorable occasion when he re- 
ceived from a Tennessee politician (who had been elected 
an honorary member of the Empire Club) a letter accept- 
ing the honor conferred upon him, and enclosing a lock of 
ex-President Andrew Jackson's hair, sent on by the hero of 
New Orleans. The founder of the chib wept with rever- 
ential joy, as he exhibited this memento of his political 
idol. But Rynders' most notable speech was that which 
he delivered on horseback, one night just after the close of 
the Polk-Clay campaign. It was at first reported that the 
Whigs had won and Henry Clay was the victor, and Mr. 
Frelinghuysen, who was nominated for "Vice-President on 
the Clay ticket was serenaded by the Whigs (as related in 
another letter). When he made his appearance on the 



310 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

balcony of his hotel in response to the serenade, and mod- 
estly disclaimed all pride or delight in his election, he 
wound up his speech to the enthusiastic Whigs by declar- 
ing that he " would welcome the day when his term of office 
should expire, and that he would be more glad to get rid 
of his office then than his friends were glad to bestow it on 
him now." But, within a day or two, the neMS came that 
not Clay, but Polk, and not Frelinghuysen, but Dallas, had 
been elected. Then Rynders, at the head of the Empire 
Club, started off to the house of Benjamin F. Butler, a New 
York lawyer, who had placed Mr. Polk in nomination at 
the Baltimore Convention, and announced the glad tidings. 
By a strange coincidence, Butler lived next door to the 
domicile in which Frelinghuysen was stopping, and so the 
Whig candidate, who had been congratulated on his success 
one night, sat at his window, a night or two after, while the 
crowd celebrated the success of his opponent. 

Rynders was mounted on a fine gray horse, which he 
rode well. Sitting on his horse, right under Butler's 
window, he addressed that gentleman in his usual blunt, 
enthusiastic way, congratulating him on the victory of his 
nominee. During his speech, Frelinghuysen poked his 
head out to listen — naturally enough — and Kynders caught 
a glimpse of him. The sight of the defeated Whig candi- 
date gave the Democratic enthusiast a bright idea, which he 
acted upon with characteristic promptitude. Driving his 
horse right under the Whig candidate's window, Rynders 
said, addressing the astonished Frelinghuysen : 

•' You stated the other night, sir, that you would feel 
glad when your time came to be relieved of the cares of 
office. We Democrats have taken you at your word. As 
a Democrat, I am glad to announce to you that James 
Iv. Polk has been elected President, and George M. Dallas 
Vice President, and that, therefore, you are relieved from 
all furtlier cares or duty as Vice President." So saying, 



CAPRICES OF ELECTION RETURNS. 311 

Kyiuk-rs 1»()\\im1 to tlu' cliai;Tiiie(l Frt'liii<;liuyRon, M'ho had 
not a word to say. wliili' the Kinpiri' CUub thuiulenM] its 
aj>i>hiiise at tlie cool Iiiipiidt'iice ot " the man on liorsc- 
hack." 

^Ir. Pmtler-s reply to llynder's coniplinientary address to 
liini was as full of huneonihe as liad been Kynder's address 
to Butler, " Tlie Enijilre State lias saved the Union," said 
Mr. Butler, from his window ; " the Empire City has saved 
the Empire State, and the Empire Club has saved the Etu- 
])ire City ! " After so much " soft sawder," as Sam Slick 
would say, it was no wonder that Rynders became more and 
more impressed with the idea that the credit of discovering 
and electing James K. Polk President of the United 
States, was due to him. 

The Polk-Clay campaign, in some respects, presented a 
very close analogy to the Cleveland-Blaine campaign, which 
I have briefly described in another letter. The result w-as 
in dispute for several days, and Rynders (who seemed to 
feel all the responsibility of the campaign) was reduced 
from triumph to despair, and then brought up from despair 
to triumph several times. The Tribune^ under Greeley 
then, just as the Trilnune, under Whitelaw Reid, in 1884, 
insisted that the Democrats were defeated, and the town 
was kept in an excited state by the issue of " extras." But, 
one afternoon, reports reached the City that several of the 
interior counties in this State had given Polk such majorities 
as to insure his election ; and then the Democratic rooster 
crowed most lustily. Capt. Rynders and Elijah F. Purdy, 
the old war-horses of the city Democracy, were quick to 
hear the news, and they determined at once to have a 
''hurrah." They went to Tammany Hall (now the Sun 
building), and Rynders gave orders to have it lighted up, 
while he ordered whiskey for the crowd that had assembled, 
and Purdy backed up the refreshment end of the racket. 
They were going to have " a high old time" that night, sure 



812 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

enough. This was about six o'clock. But about seven 
o'clock, a Hudson River steamboat came in from Albany, 
bringing a hastily-written letter from Thurlow Weed, the 
Whig leader of the State, to Horace Greeley, contain- 
ing the statement that the State and the- election had gone 
for Clay " beyond a doubt." This news Avas a dampener to 
the Democracy, and the lights just lit in Tammany Hall 
were put out as soon as possible. But the day after, about 
four o'clock, as Rynders stood on the steps of the»old Park 
Theatre, on Park Row, quoting Shakespeare to Simpson, 
the manager, and trying to take his political -defeat as 
philosophically as he could, suddenly a boy ran along 
bawling out an " Extra Smi,'''' which contained the news : 
" Madison county has gone for Polk by a large majority. 
Oneida county also in the Democratic line. The State safe 
for Polk. He is surely elected." And then there was no 
more Shakespeare for Rynders that afternoon. Having 
first convinced himself of the truth of this later news, so as 
to have no more " waste of ammunition," Rynders again 
ordered Tammany Hall to be lighted up in the best and 
brightest style of illumination — for which tallow candles 
were used in those days — and sending out orders for a 
gathering of the Empire Club, with a band of music, the 
victory was celebrated by a parade, winding up with 
Pynders' speech on horseback, as described. 

The Empire Club, though a strictly local organization, 
had its honorary members all over the country, and granted 
"dispensations" to other States, after the manner of the 
Order of Free Masons. It also had a Brooklyn branch, 
which became quite important. The Brooklyn Empire 
Club was under the management of Moses Odell, who was 
a strange mixture, like Eynders himself, of a religious man 
and politician. Odell, every Sunday night, was exhorting 
at the Methodist cliaoel. under Rev. Dr. Green, and every 
Monday night he was to be found among " the boys," hav- 



FIRST ELECTION FOR MAYOR. 313 

ing what lie called "a good time." But, as in Rynders' 
cflse, so in Odoir?, it was the earnestness and goodness at 
the bottom of the man that carried him through. Rynders 
and Odell once met, and com[)ared notes as to the official 
salaries at the C'ustom House, which they had received as a 
recognition of their political service in the Polk campaign. 
Rynders, the real founder of the Empire Cluh, was oidy 
receiving the paltry sum of $1,800 a year from the Admini- 
stration he had done so much to elect, whereas, Odell, his 
P)rooklyn assistant, was getting $8,000 a year. This was a 
case in which the tail received more consideration than the 
dog; but it at least shows that Rynders did not serve his 
])arty for mere dollars and cents, as seems to l)e too much 
the rule in these modern days. 

Captain Rynders was born and brought up during a 
period when principle was the predominating motive 
among politicians and political leaders in the metropolis. 
Before the adoption of the new State Constitution, the 
system of governing the State was by officials appointed 
by the Governor, who had the appointment of judicial 
officers, and of most of our local officers, except Sheriff, 
Register, a County Clerk and Justices of the Peace. 
The transferring of political power from the ricli prop- 
erty hcdders to the non-property holders, by the State 
Constitution, was the practical carrying out of the demo- 
cratic over the aristocratic doctrine, of the government 
by the whole instead of the few. And then began the 
period ot: the gradual and steady rise of Tammany Hall 
to absolute power in this city. The first Mayor of New 
York elected by the people, in 188-1-, was Cornelius W. 
Lawrence, who received only two liundred majority, so 
eveidy was the vote of the city at that time divided 
between the Democrats and Whigs. 

This much can be said for Rynders. If he was a hard 
fighter for his party, he was a tirtn friend to those to 



S14 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

whom he was attaclied. Once an intimate, always an 
intimate, if one behaved himself. Unlike most politicians, 
he never forgot. Isaac V. Fowler, the defanlting Post- 
master of this city, many years ago, had been kind to 
Kynders when he needed help, and when he got into 
tronble — more for his party than for himself — Rynders, 
as a friend, warned him through a mutual friend, a lady 
boarding at the then 'New York Hotel, that " he would, as 
U. S. Marshal, be obliged to arrest him." And Fowler 
took the beautiful and fashionable Mrs. Oscar Cole's kindly 
and womanly hint, and fled — infinitely to Marshal Rynders' 
relief. Rough as he seemed to be, a kinder, truer man 
never lived than Captain (ex-Marshal) Isaiah Rynders. 

A brief reference to another eccentricity of the metrop- 
olis, the Count Joannes, as he called himself— though his 
real name was George Jones — may interest you. The 
Count did not figure in politics, but he " mixed in" every- 
thing else of a public character. He was, taken all in all, 
one of the quaintest figures in New York life. For many 
years he was on the stage, and at one time enjoyed a good 
reputation as an actor, both in England and this country. 
He claimed that the title " Count Joannes " was bestowed 
upon him in Europe, because of his merit as a historian. 
The later years of his life were spent by the Count in 
attendance at the Courts in this city, and his active partici- 
pation in cases was not infrequent ; but he had himself 
for a client in the majority of his suits. Among the 
well-known actions brought by him were suits for alleged 
libel against persons who had denied the genuineness of 
his title, and his proceedings against Mr. Sothern (the 
original " Lord Dundreary ") who, he alleged, had wrought 
him great damage by what he conceived to be a carica- 
ture of himself in Sothern's part in the play called " The 
Crushed Tragedian." But his litigation brought him little 
or no profit, though it kept him before the public, and that 



GEORGK, TIIK COUNT .TOAN^fE.^. SlS 

M'as his stock in trade. The Count had an all-absorbing 
])assion for notoriety at any cost, and was always trying 
to attract attention at celebrated trials, or on other occa- 
sions M'hen he could make himself prominent. At the 
IFonrv AVard JBeecher trial, for instance, he interrupted the 
j)r()CC'odings one day by a suggestion to Mr. Wm. M. 
Kvarts, and even attempted to give the Judge on the Bench 
advice. 

The Count was tall and large, and had a scholarly stoop. 
His face was long, and showed his age, although he evi- 
dently tried to repair the ravages of years by coloring his 
heavy moustache. It was apparent that he wore a wig, but 
he tried his best to conceal the fact. A carefully arranged 
lock fell over his brow, and the hair was worn long on 
his coat-collar. The Count prided himself on his marked 
resemblance to John T. Hoffman, of whom he was a great 
admirer. lie generally wore a heavy felt hat and black 
broadcloth clothes, always very bright in spots. For a 
cravat he generally used a red ribbon, to which he attached 
his " order." He often carried easily in one hand a pair of 
black kid gloves, while the other was thrust in his bosom. 
His attitudes were always studied and theatrical. He 
was never frivolous, and resented the least attempt to 
trifle with his dignity. Count Joannes was indeed a quaint 
make-up, even at a period which might be termed the era 
of picturesque characters. 



LETTER XXVIII. 

Rumblings Preceding the Storm— Beginning of Popular 
Distrust— Concealment of Financial Conditions— Hid- 
den Provision of the Tax Levy Which Gave New Life 
to the Ring — Corrupt Practices of the Judiciary De- 
nounced By a Fearless Lawyer— What Led to the 
Formation of the Bar Association — How a Willing 
Governor Pulled Tweed's Chestnuts Out of the Fire — 
The Ring Bracing Itself Against Adverse Criticisms 
AND Entrenching Itself Behind Atrocious Legislative 
Enactments. 

My dear Dean : 

After the passage of the City Cliarter in 1870, the Eing 
was in full possession of the City of New York, and throngh 
the extensive scope and insidious provisions of that instru- 
ment the looting of the City Treasury began with amazing 
boldness and rapacity. Not yet understanding the immense 
powers conferred by the Charter, and unaware of the 
wholesale peculations carried on, the people were generally 
quiescent; and not until late in the Fall of tliat year were 
the rumblings of discontent heard in any disquieting volume, 
although suspicion, nurtured by hints and rumors, had begun 
to take possession of the public mind. But it was not un- 
til after the adjournment of the Legislature of 1871 that any 
serious trouble began. 

The New York Times became bold and vigorous in its 
denunciations of the Tammany oligarchy and of the cor- 
ruption of the Judiciary ; but, tliat being a Republican 
organ, its fulminations were attributed more to political 
partisanship than to patriotic zeal. In the month of Oc- 
tober, 1870, it asked editorially : 

316 



DEFIANT KIXO .H'DGES. ;!17 

" Can lliis Islaud be the culiniiiuting point of the enterprise, the cul- 
ture, the wealth and power of the continent, yet its people be incapable 
to shake off the rule of the dozen sordid men of selfish hearts and nar- 
row brains who have idundered us of nullions yearly, obstructed our 
material ,!:;ro\\ih, made our markets, our wharves and piers and streets, 
mere monuments of their rapacity, our elections a farce, and now have 
put up Judges in our very Court-houses to sell injustice for a price? " 

A strong niuniciiial ticket was in the field against the 
Taniniany candidates. Apollo Hall had nominated, for 
Mayor, Thomas A. Ledwith, Democrat, who was endorsed 
by the Republicans, and the rest of the ticket was made 
up of strong men, regardless of their previous political 
affiliations. But this formidable ticket was unavailing, as 
the Ring had absohite control of the election machinery, 
and the Tammany ticket was returned with A. Oakey Hall 
re-elected as Mayor. At that election also Jolm T. Hoff- 
man was re-elected Governor. 

The people were wholly ignorant of the financial condi- 
tion of the city, the Comptroller not Jiaving made a report 
for the preceding two years. The Times kept ham- 
mering away, day after day, in fearless terms pointing out 
the grievances of the citizens. It had several editorials 
criticising Samuel J. Tilden. It claimed that, although ac- 
quainted with the doings of the Ring, Mr. Tilden had pre- 
sided over Tweed's packed State Convention at Rochester, 
" composed of men of such proclivities that they tried to 
pick their own Chairman's pocket of his watch as he left 
the room." " Governor Hoffman," it declared in another 
place, "helped to build that $850,000 house in Fifth 
avenue and to support the Fiskian orgies." In another 
editorial it stated that " there is no quarter of the civilized 
world where the name of a I^ew York Judge is not a hiss- 
ing and a by-word.'' 

The Ring Judges were in those days almost openly cor- 
ru])t. They committed acts in direct violation of law 
and in bold defiance of public opinion. The fraudu- 



318 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

lent naturalization of citizens was only regarded in the liglit 
of a pastime. It is a matter of record that in fourteen days, 
from the 8th to the 23d of October, 1S68, Judge Barnard 
naturalized 10,093 citizens. 

Here and there throughout these letters, my dear Dean, 
I have dwelt upon the fact that the rascalities of the Tweed 
Ring in New York City could not have been perpetrated 
without the connivance of Republicans both in New York 
City and in the State Legislature at Albany. During the 
Legislative Session of 1870 the Ring inspired the passage of 
several bills, in addition to the City Charter, enlarging its 
power and safeguarding it against contingencies. 

Up to 1870 the office of Comptroller in New York City 
had been elective, the term being four years. This pro- 
vision was retained in the new Charter, which went into 
eifect on April 5, 1870, and Connolly's term expired with 
the close of the year. The bill providing for the City 
budget (commonly known as the Tax Levy) was delayed 
as usual until near the end of the session, when it was 
' rushed through," becoming a law on April 26 — precisely 
three weeks after the Charter had become operative. "When 
the Tax Levy was critically examined, the following "little 
joker" was found snugly ensconced amid its numerous 
provisions : 

" The Comptroller of the City of New York shall hereafter be ap- 
pointed by the Mayor and shall hold his office for the period of four 
years, as now provided, except that the person first appointed under 
this authority shall hold his office until the first day of January, 1875. 
* * * The term of office of the present Comptroller of said City shall 
end at the expiration of five days from the passage of this act. The 
Mayor shall make the first appointment herein provided for within five 
days from the passage of this Act. Any provision of law inconsistent 
with this section is hereby repealed." 

For at least three years the Ring thieves had been doing 
a flourishing business, and it would be downright folly to 
incur the danger of an election for a new Comptroller, 



BEGINNING OF THE BAK ASSOCtATtON. 31« 

Wliile, from the appearance of things, tlie Ring magnates 
liad every assurance of carrying tlie City elections in the Fall, 
yet they deemed it good generalship to take no possil)le risk 
of the entrance of some stitf -necked reformer into the office 
of Comptroller ; for there lay the key to the citadel. Even 
should their entire County ticket he beaten, the ''little 
joker " in the Tax Levy would intrench their own criminal 
associate in the Comptrollership for four years and eight 
months, to hide as well as to facilitate their grand larcenies 
and his own. Accordingly, within live days after the Tax 
Lew became a law, Mayor Hall appointed Richard B. 
Connolly Comptroller for an additional term of four years 
and eight months. [Slippery Dick !] 

Obviously the Ring had reason to feel secure in its posi- 
tion and to laugh at hostile criticism. The Executive, the 
Lecrislature, the Courts and the voters were harnessed to its 
chariot. When impeachment of some of the Judges was 
threatened, Judge Barnard defiantly retorted : " Lnpeach- 

ment be d d ! We have money enough to buy up the 

Legislature ! '' 

Tims the saturnalia proceeded in the Courts and through 
the Courts, recklessly and gaily, until the courage and 
ability of one member of the Bar furnished a glorious, in- 
spiring example to his brethren. Judge Barnard had ap- 
pointed John B. Haskin Receiver of the Washington Life 
Insurance Company, and in a proceeding for an accounting 
Mr. Ilaskin was on the witness-stand before Judge Barnard. 
James T. Brady proceeded to cross-examine him as to his 
conduct as Receiver. Mr. Haskin, feeling himself fortified 
by the friendship of Judge Barnard, answered evasively and 
impudently, at the same time indulging in coarse jests at the 
expense of Mr. Brady. 

Mr. Brady insisted on direct answers to his interrogatories. 
Judge Barnard flippantly sustained Mr. Haskin in every 
instance, until at lengtli Mr. Brady, rising to the height of 



320 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLiTlCS. 

his great powers, and brusliing aside all respect for tlie 
Judge, boldly asked questions directly inculpating Judge 
Barnard and his favorite Keceiver. lie almost directly 
charged them with joint corruption. In vibrant tones, and 
with hand pointed at the Judge, he said that he made his 
statement regardless of consequences, and that, in the inter- 
est of the profession and in vindication of the Court, he was 
not only ready to make a personal sacrifice, but that he 
should appeal to all honest men and all courageous lawyers 
to aid him in driving from power those who were degrad- 
ing the administration oi justice. If any other man than 
Mr. Brady had delivered this philippic, he would probably 
have been summarily committed for contempt of court; 
but Barnard, knowing Brady's power as the foremost 
lawyer and forensic orator of his day, did not lift a finger 
against the avalanche of Brady's denunciation, but sat pale 
and trembling and paralyzed with fear. This was the first 
forward step in the fight against the corrupt Judiciary. 
The members of the Bar took courage. A number of the 
more prominent of them met and determined that they 
should rally around their fearless leader. Another meeting 
was held, and it was resolved that they should take a stand 
against the torrent of corruption, accepting all the conse- 
quences, even to the penalty of imprisonment for contempt. 
Thus was formed the nucleus of the organization which has 
since been known as " The Association of the Bar of the 
City of New York." 

It w^as Brady's courage that inspired them. 

I must stop a moment to tell you of this gifted man. 
Born in this city, in 1815, James T. Brady grew up under 
cultured and refined influences. His father, Thomas S. 
Brady, was an eminent lawyer and jurist who was as inflex- 
ible in his honesty as he was dignified in his deportment. 
Long before young James had completed his collegiate 
studies, did his father observe in him natural talents and 




(Kediawu from Uaiper's Wetkly. Ky pi'iiniKsion. i 

James T. Bkadv, 



JAMES T. HKADY I.KADS A CHISADE. 



:i31 



nnaliiicatiuns for tl.o k-al profession wl.icli afterwards so 
laro-elv contril-utv*! to Lis fauu'. When not more tlian IG 
yerrsol.l, young Urady bogun to take a voluntary interest 
ill his father's eases— even ventured to discuss certani 
asi)ects of them, and so enwrapt with the study of the 
law had he become, that he often followed his father into 
Court, at this early a^e, to watcli the progress of the legal 
battle, and even take an nnobtrnsive band in it himself. 

He was a most comely youth, with clean-cut features, 
classic bead and expressive eyes. After bis admission t<. 
the Bar, and when a young man of 26 years, be acquired 
considerable fame in tbe case of Sarab Coppin, a young 
Enolisb girl, whose parents bad died on the voyage to this 
coulitiv^^'find who, liaving been robbed of her money on 
ber arrival, was turned into tbe streets and, under the ex- 
isting statutes in such cases, was taken up and l^ound ont 
by tbe authorities. 

Young Brady was retained to secure her liberation, i 
cannot here go' into the legal aspects of the case, nor de- 
scribe tbe skill and spirit dispkyed by tbe young advocate 
in a cause wbicb, nnimportant enougb in itself, became 
reallv celebrated by reason of the public interest in it 
which was evoked by the zeal and eloquence of ber 
counsel. He showed himself more than the master of his 
opponent, who was tbe legal representative of the authori- 
ties and a man of large experience and great ability m his 

profession. 

His eloquence even at this age attracted the attention or 
tbe entire l?ar. Moreover, he was learned, logical and forci- 
l)le. All these qualities, combined with great manly 
beauty, unaffected affability, and charming manners, lifted 
him almost at a spring into prominence in his profession. 
From that time forward until his death, in 1869, there were 
few celebrated cases, either in the civil or criminal branches 
of the Courts, that Brady was not retained in on one side 



322 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

or the other. As he grew in years his legal ability, espe- 
cially in jury cases, became remarkable. Let a case last a 
week before a jury and he was almost invincible. Without 
any apparent effort on his part the jurors became, so to 
speak, enamored of him. 

With all this, his income was never half as large as it 
ought to have been. He was too princely in all his in- 
stincts to worry over fees. In one week, he secured the 
acquittal of four clients in murder trials, without receiving 
a dollar's compensation. His financial success was better, 
liowever, in civil actions because, in latter days, his prac- 
tice was generally confined to cases where he was retained 
as counsel, and where he was not compelled to go through 
the distasteful ordeal of asking for fees. He never him- 
self settled the amount of his retainer, but left it entirely 
to the discretion of the brother lawyer who needed his 
counsel. He never was known to grumble about his fee, 
or hardly even talk about it, and acted as if that question 
was a mere trifling incident in the case. Hence his income 
was never more than $25,000 a year, when he could easily 
have made it $50,000. 

Urged frequently to enter into City politics, he steadily 
refused. In 1843, he served a short time as District Attor- 
ney of this City and County, to which position he was 
appointed during the absence of the regular incumbent, and 
two years later he became Corporation Attorney. A strong 
State's-rights man, he supported Breckenridge (the Southern 
candidate for the Presidency) against Stephen A. Douglas, 
in 1860, and ran for Governor of this State that year, on 
what was called the " hard-shell " or pro-slavery ticket. In 
1859, he made the openhig speech for the defence in the 
trial of Daniel E. Sickles, for the murder of WiUiani, Bar- 
ton Key, which, for superb eloquence and dramatic effect, 
was seldom equalled in a Court of law. He was appointed 
QU the " Commission to inquire into the Administration of 



TWEED "STEALS A MAKCIT." 



323 



the Department of the Gulf, under Generals Butler and 
Banks,'' but for some reason the rejiort of the investigation 
was never published. 

Mi: Brady had literary tastes, and was a contributor to 
tiie oUl Knickerbocker Magazine, published in this City. 
One of his stories, " A Christmas Dream," written in an 
easv, liowing style, shows the sympathetic and sentimental 
nature «»f the great advocate. 

This was the lawyer who, in the prime of his nuudiood, 
stood before the corrupt .ludge and made him quail with 

fear. 

By an amendment of the Judiciary article of the State 
Constitution, adopted in L801), no Judge could thereafter 
sit in review of his own decision. There were then only 
five Judges of the Supreme Court in the City of New 
York, that city constituting the First Judicial District of 
the State. A General Term of the Court, composed of 
three Judges, constituted then the Appellate Tribnnal of 
the Supreme Court within the City of New York. The 
Legislture of 1870 passed a law empowering the Governor 
to appoint, for a term of Hre years, the members of the 
General Terms in the eight Judicial Districts into which the 
State was divided. The Bar Association, now alive to the 
danger of complete centralization of judicial power in the 
hands of the Ring Judges, called a meeting to discuss 
the phases of the new law and to take some action which 
might ward off the threatened danger. 

For several days the lawyers of the City freely discussed 
the sitnation, and the general opinion was that Governor 
Hoffman, in view of all the accusations made against the 
Rinir Judges, would for once resist political dictation and 
designate at least two outside Judges for the General Terra 
in this city. The Bar Association ])assed resolutions, ad- 
dressed to the Governor, which set forth in etlect, among 
other things, that most of the appeals in this City would be 



324 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

from jud<i;ments and orders made by the Judges who would 
sit in the General Term, unless outside Judges were desig- 
nated ; that, under the new amendment to the Judiciary 
article of the Constitution, this would plainly embarrass and 
interrupt the business of the Courts and cause delay and in- 
convenience ; and they appealed to His Excellency the 
Governor to appoint Judges outside of the City who would 
not be obliged at intervals to vacate their seats upon the 
Bench, as each of the local Judges would have to do when- 
ever any case passed upon by him came up for review. 

AVhile these reasons were sound in themselves, the main 
object in view, however, was to secure Judges for the 
General Term Bench who wore outside the influence of the 
Tammany leaders, so tliat there might be some hope of ob- 
taining impartial justice, at least in the highest tribunal of 
the City. In order to add strength to the resolutions, a 
committee of prominent lawyers was selected to proceed 
to Albany and urge the matter personally upon the Gov- 
ernor. Charles O'Conor, Joseph H. Choate, Henry JSTicoll, 
Wheeler H. " Peckham and William E. Curtis com- 
posed the committee. The resolution appointing the 
committee had hardly passed before Judge Barnard 
got word of it. He at once rushed off to Tweed's 
house and told him of the action of the Bar Association and 
of the intended visit to Albany of the distinguished com- 
mittee. Tweed listened to Judge Barnard, with a quizzical 
look, and then said : " When did you hear all this, Judge ? " 
" Ten minutes ago," replied Judge Barnard ; " I drove up 
here as soon as I heard it." "Well," said Tweed, laying 
his hand on Judge Barnr.rd's shoulder, "these Bar Associa- 
tion people are very clever, but they are a little slow. At 
two o'clock this afternoon, I learned what tiiey intended 
doing to-night, and so, to relieve all parties of further em- 
barassment in the matter, I telegraphed the Governor, and 
at precisely three o'clock this afternoon Judges Ingrahara, 



O'GORMAN'S DEFENCE OF THE KING. 32r, 

Barnard and (.'ardozc. were named as the General Term in 
this district for the next five vears ! " Then both Laughed 
heartily at the assured discomfiture of the committee. 

Next morning, tlie committee telegraphed Governor 
Hoffman that they intended to start for Albany tliat day, to 
present the resolutions and to be heard on the subject (which 
was brieliy explained) if that day would be agreeable to 
him ; and received an immediate reply that it was too late, 
as the appointment had already been made. 

It is one of the weaknesses of human nature that, 
when a man does an act which in his own conscience he 
feels to be unworthy of him, he generally launches forth 
into an apology or excuse for his conduct, even before any 
one puts hin/on the defensive. So Governor Hoffman, 
who paraded before the public as a statesman of very lofty 
ideals, sought to justify his othcial action in the following 
memo'randmn which he had hied with his appointment : 

"I have found it impossible, as the Departments are constituted and 
the time of holding the General Tenn tixed, to make any arrangements 
mutually satisfactory to the Judges and myself for transferring -Tudges 
from one Department to another, to act as presiding and Associate Jus- 
tices, and I am constrained to designate for the General Term, m each 
Department, Judges who reside within it." 

Tricked by Tweed and Governor Hoffman, the Bar 
Association now, instead of being dismayed, determined to 
consolidate their strength for resistance to the Judicial 
tyranny and corruption which at that time made honest men 
avoid the Courts ahnost as they w^ould a pestilence. 

On account of the clamor which was gradually rising 
against the Tannnany Ring, it was determined to silence 
the critics by the eloquence and sophistry of its orators— a 
practice in vogue in that institution at the present day. On 
October 13, 1870, the Tammany General Connnittee held a 
meeting at the Fourteenth street Wigwam, at which a great 
speech \vas made by the then Corporation Counsel, Richard 
O'Gorman. Mr. O'Gorman well deserved the name of the 



S^ THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

" silver-tongued orator." But he was more ; he was learned, 
logical, forcible and magnetic, with a history as an Irish 
patriot whose escape from English myrmidons was and is an 
interesting romance, 

Tweed himself, alive to the importance of the occasion, 
presided. Mr. O' Gorman was at his best. He acted as if 
he sincerely believed what he said. Perhaps he did. Tweed 
evidently intended that, through him, New York should 
be favored with what he believed to be a complete answer 
to those who criticised the Tammany Hall leaders. Mr. 
O'Gorman may have been hoodwinked by Tweed, who was 
an expert political mesmerist. At any rate, Mr. O'Gorman 
pronounced the charges made in the Times and other papers 
to be " false, scandalous, and idle." He said that the City 
government was properly and economically conducted, and 
pointed to the men who were the heads of the various de- 
partments, asking who would dare doubt their integrity ? 
I reproduce a portion of his speech, because it will enable 
you to comprehend Tweed's astuteness in selecting public 
officers : 

If the question is to be fairly put before the people (said Mr. O'Gorman) 
—if instead of the present Ring, composed if you will, of Mr. Tweed, 
Mr. Sweeny and Mr. Hall— if, instead of that, there is to be a Ring 
composed of any other men that I have ever heard named in what is 
called the " Young Democratic Party," I for one will stand by the old 
Ring, because I believe it has more sagacity, more power, more intelli- 
gence, more political skill and more promise of success than the other ! 
[Applause.] 

First, let me take the Department of Docks. The docks are the first 
thing a stranger sees in the City, and the first thing of which a citizen 
of New York in times past ought to have been ashamed. They have 
been in a disgraceful condition. An immense quantity of money must 
be spent upon them ; an immense number of men must be employed 
upon them. Now, whom did Mayor Hall appoint in this department ? 
He appointed William Wood— my old friend, a Scotchman, a man of 
enlightened intellect, of high character, a banker known in New York, 
throughout America and in Europe, and respected wherever he is 
known ; Mr. Agnew, a merchant than whom there is none more honored 



ABLE OFFICIALS IN OLD RING DAYS. 32? 

in the City of New York ; Wilson G. Ilunt-wluit can be said against 
him ? Did any man ever attach to that honored name the shghtest 
cloud of dishonor ? 

Who is the Chief Engineer of the Department of Docks ? A man of 
hi-h reputation in his profession ; a man who has filled the highest 
omces with honor and dignity ; a soldier who, in all the heat of civil war, 
never forgot that he was a citizen, a gentleman and a Christian— George 
B. McClellan. 

Who is the disbursing officer of this "corrupt " department ? Jacob 
A. Westervelt, an old Knickerbocker, once a Mayor of New York, an 
old shipbuilder, a man in whom everybody contides. Is it from men 
like these that corruption is to be expected ? * * * 

AVhom have they appointed in the Department of Parks ? Is Henry 
Hilton respectable ? He is the Treasurer and the Chief Executive 
officer of that Department ; a gentleman who has filled high offices ; a 
Judge, a jurist, a man the counselor of the most important mercantile 
interest in the world ; a gentleman of culture and refinement. 

Let us pass to the Education Board. Whom have we there ? Mr. 
Wood, Mr. Sands, of the Citizens' Association, Magnus Gross, well 
representing the German element. What have they done ? They have 
have saved the City one million of dollars per year ; and they have 
lur"-ely increased the accommodation to the scholars of the city. 

Charities and Corrections— Isaac Bell, Mr. Nicholson, Mr. Bowen. 
Is there any objection to either of them ? 

Take the Police Department : Judge Bosworth— a man of dignity and 
reputation ; the contemporary of and coequal with such men as Oakley 
and Duer— the flower and perfection of our Judiciary in the days when 

they lived. 

But I see one spot, if any, where the Republican party has cause to 
complain. I refer to the Department of Public W^orks [Applause]. Ah, 
gentlemen, that department is presided over by a fearless man commonly 
called "Boss Tweed." The accusations against Mr. Tweed (he will 
pardon me for alluding to them in his presence) are very numerous and 
somewhat difficult to deal with It is said that Mr. Tweed has a gor- 
geous house. Well, I do not know about that ; but I guess every one of 
us would like to have a gorgeous house ! But Mr. Tweed has a stable, 
and he has horses and he allows each horse ten feet square. That is a 
mistake ; five is enough ! 

Now crentlemen, it seems to me that the perfection of Mr. Tweed's 
house is'a matter for Mr. Tweed's family and for Mr. Tweed's guests. 
The condition of Mr. Tweed's stable is a matter of interest only to Mr. 
Tweed and to Mr. Tweed's horses. What the Timea newspaper has to 
do with all these things— unless upon the principle I have alluded to, of 



m THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

flinging plenty of dirt, with the idea tliat some of it may stick — is more 
than I can understand. * * * 

Mr. O'Gorman concluded by showing that the City of New York was 
economically governed. 

Mr. O' Gorman also put forth a special — and I might say, 
a specious — plea in defence of Governor Hoffman's ap- 
pointment of General Term Judges, and particularly ex- 
cusing his approval of the Erie bill, which he was alleged 
to have signed at the behest of Tweed. All the newspapers 
next morning printed copious reports of O'Gorman's speech, 
which lulled the doubts and misgivings of many citizens. 
The array of names cited by the orator attests the sagacity 
of Tweed. He was a Boss keen-witted enough to appreci- 
ate the advantage of identifying men of ability and good 
repute with his administration by putting them into places 
of honor while himself and his confederates took charge of 
the ''profits." 

Had any Legislative Committee of that time, dazzled by 
the lavishness of his expenditures, impaled him on the 
query, " Where did you get it ? '' the blithe and buoyant 
Boss would doubtless have responded : " That is my per- 
sonal business. I decline to answer ! " 

As illustrative of .Tweed's disposition, as well as of 

his estimate of the character of " Slippery Dick," and 

his other associates, I copy the following which appeared 

in the New York Sun, after Tweed's downfall : 

Tweed was too generous in his estimate of men. He was almost in- 
variably deceived in his acquaintances. There were not five in the large 
circle of his " friends " but took advantage of his weakness. He re- 
spected Sweeny as a great manipulator of men. He liked Hall, but 
said he had no ballast. For Connolly (" Slippery Dick") he had the 
utmost contempt. With all his show of suavity and courtliness Con- 
noly was at heart mean and crafty. It used to grate on Tweed's soul, 
when his friends, especially of the poorer sort had to pay tribute to 
Connolly, or his son or some of the leeches around him, or else wait his 
pleasure for payment of the money due them. On one occasion a city 
creditor appealed to Tweed to use his influence with Connolly to have 
his bill paid. 



BELSHAZZAR FEAST IN THE WIGWAM. 329 

" Is it all right ? " asked Tweed. 

" Certainly." said the other. 

" Have you asked for it ?" 

" Twenty times aud I can't get it unles.s I give up 20 per cent." 

Tweed looked at him for a moment then taking a slip of paper hur- 
riedly wrote to Comptroller Connolly as follows : — 
" Dear Dick : 

" For God's sake, pay 's hill, lie tells me your people want 

20 per cent. The whole d d thing isn't but $1,100. If you don't pay 

it I will. 

"Thine, 

"Wm. M. Tweed." 

Tlie creditor got liis money at once and in full. 

On the 27th of October, 1870, ten days before the elec- 
tion, Tammany had, both inside and outside the Wigw^am, 
perhaps the greatest demonstration in its history. A pro- 
cession of the various districts throughout the City blocked 
the streets for several miles around. On the platform with- 
in the building were seated Horatio Seymour, who, two 
years before, had run for the Presidency; Governor John 
T. Hoffman, candidate for re-election; Kerr of Indiana; 
Tilden, and a large number of noted men in local, State 
and iSTational politics. Conspicuous among them was James 
risk, Jr., who, up to this time, was known to have been a 
Republican, and w^ho now sat beside Tweed, before an 
audience which seemed almost fierce with enthusiasm, 
William M. Tweed, calling the meeting to order, made the 
opening address. He was calm and easy in manner as he 
delivered a speech which, in view of what was to be dis- 
closed eight or nine months later, was a marvellous piece of 
audacity. His concluding sentence was : 

"We know and feel that although the oppressor's hand — I mean the 
corrupt Republican party — is upon our throat, still we must calmly re- 
sist, and by the firm and judicious exercise of the proper law of our 
government, which is our only protection against wrong, show that the 
City of New York is a peaceable, law-abiding, and, as the whole world 
knows, a well-governed City." 

Tweed then introduced August Belmont as chairman of 



330 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the meeting. After Belmont, Horatio Seymour, Mr. Kerr 
and others had spoken, James Fisk, Jr., was called for by 
some of the audience. Striding to the front of the plat- 
form, he said : " I never yet voted the Democratic ticket, 
but now I will vote for it on account of my friend Tweed ; 
yes, vote for it, if I can, three times a day, and I will bring 
with me the 25,000 men under me ! " This, of course, 
elicited boisterous applause, and Fisk, who was the incarna- 
tion of vanity, strutted about the stage, receiving congratu- 
lations from one " statesman " after another at the " hit " he 
had made, and looked, and evidently felt, very proud of his 
performance. 

For a time at least, this vast demonstration, it must be 
confessed, had the desired effect. The election took place 
in a few days, and notwithstanding that a ticket made up 
of independent Democrats and Kepublicans apparently re- 
ceived the most enthusiastic support, the Tammany ticket 
was elected, including A. Oakey Hall, Mayor ; Matthew 
T. Brennan, Sheriff; and William C. Conner, County Clerk. 
Tweed had assured himself of Republican assistance, there- 
by eliciting from the Times, then a Republican organ, such 
comments as these : 

We think it is quite as true now as when old President Dwight said 
it, that although every Democrat is not a horse-thief, it is quite certain 
that every horse-thief is a Democrat. But then it would be a great 
mistake to argue from this that the rank and file of the Democracy 
really have any more indulgence for thieving than the Republicans. — 
M'w York Times, October 3, 1870. 

It is quite clear, not to mince the matter, that all the notoriously 
corrupt Republicans ought to have been kicked out of the party long 
ago. They have brought nothing but discredit upon it; they have 
crippled every effort to reform abuses, and have even made promised 
reforms a pretense for putting themselves and their dependents in office 
under Tammany — just as Mr. Nathaniel Sands, the Mr. Facing-Both- 
Ways of the day, has contrived to do. While Republicans in the rest 
of the State have been striving to do their duty, these Tammany hire- 
lings have only been anxious to find an opportunity for betraying our 
camp into the hands of the enemy. If the system which had nurtured 



TWEED'S JUDICIAL TlUri.ETS. 331 

them had been abolished some timoago, this great City woidd not now 
he at the mercy of reckless plunderers, Gov. Hoffman would not have 
been enabled to pack the 15ench with dishonest Judges, and Mr. James 
Fisk would not insult public decency every day, at the expense of the 
Erie shareholders. Tiiere is a remedy for every source of dissension 
and weakness in the Republican party, except this one. A business 
man can manage his business very well so long as his partner is not 
betraying him to a rival. Any open danger it is easy to face, but the 
snake in the grass is always troublesome. The only way is to try to 
make an end of him, and this course of treatment must be adopted with 
the Republicans who have sold tliemselves out-and-out to Tweed and 
his accomplices. After our recent experience, we hope there will 
be no hesitation in dealing sharply with Manierre, " Hank" Smith, 
" Rufe" Andrews and all their fellow renes>ades, big and little. Men 
who wear the Tammany badge must be placed beyond the reach of 
bringing shame and disgrace upon the party. — Neio York Times, October 
16, 1870. 

New Year's Day, 1871, was a day of glorious rejoicing 
for Tammany : Hoffman re-elected Governor, Hall re- 
elected Mayor, the City's fat elective offices in their 
possession, the still fatter appointive offices at the disposal 
of Mayor Hall as the plums to be bestowed by Tweed on 
those who would work " in harness ; " Daniel P. Ingraham, 
presiding Justice of the General Term of the Supreme 
Court; Judge George G. Barnard, a gay and rollicking 
dispenser of " injustice for a price," was an associate ; and 
Albert Cardozo, the Machiavelli of the Bench, whose un- 
tiring industry was not altogether in the interests of the 
public, was another associate. This Bench of Judges was 
entirely harmonious. Each had his own circle of friends 
to be looked after. Judge Barnard had James H. Cole- 
man, a lawyer, chief favorite referee and receiver. Judge 
Ingraham had his friends. Judge Cardozo had his nephew, 
Gratz Nathan, and many other friends. 

When an ap.jeal from any judgment or order came up 
for argument, the Judge who had passed upon the case 
in the Court below was obliged to retire from the 
reviewing of that particular case, leaving only two Judges 



833 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POi^ITICS. 

to consider it. For instance, if the appeal were from Judge 
Barnard's decision, Judge Barnard retired from the Bench 
during the argument; if it were from Judge Cardozo's, 
Cardozo retired during the argument ; and tlie same course 
was pursued with regard to Judge Ingraham's decisions. 
These three Judges being the obedient servants of one 
political master, all working toward one jDoint, namely to 
administer Justice in accordance with the interest of the 
Ring and its numerous prominent adherents, it is easy to 
understand that no clashing on law opinions should exist 
between them. So it was always safe to calculate that an 
appeal from any order or judgment of any of the trio Avould 
almost invariably result in an affirmance of the decision of 
the court below. 

Hence it was that, judging from the very few instances 
in which the decisions of any of the trio were reversed by 
the General Term, Barnard, Ingraham and Cardozo, ap- 
peared on the record as the most profound jurists the world 
ever knew ! You will observe that they had within their 
own keeping the reputation of one another for judicial learn- 
ing, and that, the three being known as Tweed's Judges, 
it would never do to have them appear on the record of the 
General Term as being guilty of any error. 

Thus matters progressed and apparently prospered with 
Tammany until the end of Summer drew near. Then came 
a succession of events which startled New York like so 
many thunderclaps from a sunny sky. 



LETTER XXIX. 

* 
Chiefs of the Tribe of Tammany in Their Glory — Mutual 
Congratulations on Auspicious Conditions — But a 
Powerful Newspaper Begins to "Say Things" — A 
Presentation of Figures Which Startles the Com- 
munity— Choate's Javelin of Justice^How He An- 
swered Tweed's Inquiry of " What Are You Going To 
Do About It?"— Resolutions That Meant Business 
AND Worked Wonders. 

My dear Dean : 

After the verdict of the people at the polls, in Novem- 
ber, 1870, which gave such a flattering endorsement to the 
King A-dministration of the City government, Tweed, 
Sweeny, Hall and Connolly sat down, so to speak, to the 
feast which the citizens of New York had spread before 
them. There was so much political " pap " to be distributed 
on and after the first of January, when the newly-elected 
officers would be installed under the provisions of the new 
Charter, that it was necessary in advance of that time to 
consider the claims of the numerous supporters, depend- 
ents, camp-followers and sycophants who clustered daily 
in and about Tweed's headquarters. And there came, too, 
and hovered around Tweed, several Republican leaders, 
looking for the btjnus which had been promised as their 
reward for cutting the political throats of their own party 
candidates. 

New Year's Day, 1871, brought a vast multitude 3f 
political grandees to the City Hall, to congratulate A. 
( )ukey Hall on his second triumphant election as Mayor of 
the American metropolis. Girt by a bevy of sweet-scented 
politicians there stood the Mayor in all his glory, looking 

883 



334 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the embodiment of sincerity and integrity and goodness. 
There, too, was Tweed, and Sweeny, and " Slippery Dick," 
and Keyser, and Ingersol, and " Big Andy" Garvey. 

"What a shame it was for the New York Times and other 
papei^ to even suspect such a jovial, genial, happy and inno- 
cent looking group, of having committed theft and plunder! 
These worthies had the satisfaction of knowing, however, 
that the majority of the people of ISTew York did not credit 
the accusations, which, according to Tammany's great orator 
were, " false, scandalous and idle ; " for the votes of the 
people apparently gave the lie to the " maligners." 

And so the year 1871 was ushered in, gay and bright and 
promising for the Tribe of Tammany, and so it continued 
until after midsummer. 

The Times newspaper bad kept up a fairly steady bom- 
bardment of the Ring, but its assaults were generally re- 
garded as ebullitions of partisan zeal or spite. Its guns 
thundered incessantly, hotly ; but it lacked the right sort of 
ammunition until Ex-Sheriff James O'Brien carried to it 
a trainload of armor-piercing projectiles. 

Mr. O'Brien had only recently completed his term in the 
lucrative office of Sheriff. Being of a frugal and acquisitive 
mind, and therefore not satisfied with his handsome emolu- 
ments, he rolled up against the City a formidable bill of 
" extras," which the close corporation of the Ring refused 
to audit or pay. Whereat Mr. James O'Brien waxed vir- 
tuously wrathful, as did Bret Harte's " Truthful James " 
upon discovering the " ways that are dark " and the " tricks 
that are vain " of his " Heathen Chinee " protagonist at the 
gambling table. Mr. O'Brien was not a man to be trifled 
with or repulsed under such circumstances, while Tweed 
and Tweed's favored "pals" were looting the City's 
treasure-chest. 

Death played a fateful card in the game, when Auditor 
Watson was killed while driving through Central Park. 



STARTLINt; AHItAV OF STEALINGS. 335 

Employed as a clerk iii the Auditor's office was a pi-ott'-irr 
of O'Brien, one Copeland, who came across some accounts 
that bore a suspicious look. He (piictly co])ied tlie docu- 
ments and submitted them to O'Brien, who instructed liim 
to go ahead and copy otliers. Had Watson not l)een kiUcd, 
Copeland would probably have had no o[i])ortunity to ab- 
stract this evidence. Watson being dead, O'Brien got the 
mathematical proofs, and, being a patriot with a glowing 
grievance, delivered to the Thne-s tlie very ammunition for 
which that belligerent and plucky journal was pining. 

Having analyzed and mastered the damning figures, the 
Times skilfully maintained and nursed its attack through- 
out the Summer ; then, when the people were returning 
from their vacations, and election time was again approach- 
ing, it turned loose its heaviest batteries with a roar that 
startled the city from turret to foundation ; demonstrating 
clearly, irrefutably, that the municipal treasury liad been 
robbed of millions in the most barefaced and reckless 
fashion ! Was it mere assertion ? No ; for the accusation 
was accompanied with forceful evidence of its truth. Be- 
sides, the Times pledged its good faith to the public that it 
held possession of the proofs that the Treasury had been 
looted. It gave out, among other figures, that James H. 
Ingersol, cliairmaker, was paid for supplying furniture to 
the New Court House, $5,750,000. Andrew J. Garvey was 
paid nearly $3,000,000 for plastering the New Court House ; 
Keyser received $1,250,000 for plumbing work ; to J. A. 
Smith, wholly unknown, was given $750,000, Then the 
accounts showed that the thieves were humorous rascals, for 
they had it recorded that there was paid $64,000 to T. C. 
Cash — man, who had no existence, while Phillipo Donno- 
ruma, a wholly fictitious character, was credited with having 
received $66,000, and the funny politician who got the 
money signed the warrant, " Philip Dummy." Being 
interrogated on the subiect by a newspaper reporter, 



336 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Tweed said, abruptly : " Well, what are you going to do 
about it ?" 

The public was astounded at the magnitude and audacity 
of the frauds. A call for a public meeting was issued for 
Monday, September 4, 1871, at Cooper Union. The fore- 
most men in the city attended. They occupied seats on the 
platform, looking dark and determined. The auditorium 
was packed with merchants and business men, doctors and 
lawyers, mechanics and clerks. The public intelligence 
and the public conscience had awakened to the disgrace 
and the danger of the situation. They sat silent and 
sullen, as they watched the great leaders of the movement, 
who talked in groups, and almost in whispers, on the 
platform. 

Former Mayor William F. Havemeyer, a proud mer- 
chant, was made chairman. His utterances in opening the 
meeting were calm, but threatening. His manner was what 
might be expected of a bank President, who had to make to 
the directors the painful announcement that the bank had 
been robbed. Judge James Emott, who followed Mr. 
Havemeyer, analyzed the figures, and then said : " Gentle- 
men, there is no denial of these fraudulent payments and 
there is no fabrication of their amount. Now, what are you 
going to do with these men? (A voice, "Hang them!" 
This answer brought immense applause from all parts of the 
house.) I tell you, gentlemen," continued Judge Emott, 
^ that the world — the world is waiting to see if the men of 
New York believe in honesty or worship fraud, (Gteat ap- 
plause,) We must repeal this charter ; we must punish the 
guilty, and recover the money to the city. If the citizens 
of this great metropolis work in earnest, they cannot be re- 
sisted. There is no power like the power of a people armed, 
aroused, and enkindled with the enthusiasm of a righteous 
wrath ! " 

Then came the appointment of a committee on resolu- 




. KcUrawii liy poimlswlon of K. .1. Falk. foiiyri^'ht. lS9r>, by H. .1. Kiilk.) 



'J'liis i> w hat ?/V' m-c ijjdiiiii' tn do alxuit it," said 
Joseph 1 1. ( "iioate. 



CITOATK'S "JAVELIN OF JUSTICE." 337 

tloiis, composed of Josepli H. Clioiite, James Einott, P^dwanl 
Solomon, Henry Nicliol, lleuben W. llavves, John Foley^ 
and Washington K. Yermilye. While this committee was 
in session in an adjoining room, Oswald Ottendorfer, editor 
of the Staats Ze'duiuj^ and a leader of the German element 
in New York, delivered a strong, fervid and powerful de- 
nunciation of the Tammany thieves. He was followed by 
Edwards Pierrepont, who insisted that " the manhood of 
New York should assert itself and drive the marauders from 
the positions they had dishonored." 

The audience, anxious to hear the stinging rebukes and 
caustic sarcasm, ofttimes guised in pleasantries, for which 
Mr. Choate was even then noted, cried " Choate ! Choate ! " 
Mr Choate, with a scroll of paper in his hand, advanced 
slowly to the front of the platform. He was then thirty- 
nine years of age. Seldom has there been seen on a plat- 
form such a combination of physical comeliness, mental ex- 
cellence, and moral stamina, as he presented that evening 
when he hurled a '' javelin of justice" at the gorgeous and 
powerful banditti who held possession bf the City Treasury. 

'' This," said he, (presenting the scroll of paper towards 
the audience), " is what we are going to do about it ! " 

Before Mr. Choate had finished this answer to Tweed's 
defiant inquiry, the audience broke into a whirlwind of ap- 
plause, which lasted several minutes. Then, unfolding the 
paper, he read loudly and clearly : 

Eesohed. That the taxpayers and citizens of New York have learned 
with astonishment and alarm that the funded and bonded debt of the 
City and County has been more than doubled within the last two-and- 
a-half years ; that the acknowledged indebtedness of the City and 
County is now upward of $118,000,000, being over $88,000,000 more 
than what it was when the present Mayor took his office, and that there 
is reason to believe that there are floating, or contingent, or pretended 
debts and claims, against the City and County, which will amount to 
many millions of dollars in addition, which will be paid out of the City 
and County Treasury, unless the present linancial olficials are removed 
or their proceedings arrested. 



338 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLtTtCS. 

Basolved : That the distinct, precise and emphatic charges, in regard 
to the use and expenditure of the enormous sum and the fraudulent 
misappropriation of the public money, which have been made against 
the present City and County officials, have been met by these officers 
with contemptuous denials of any power to interfere, with flippant 
evasions, with studied concealment of a large part of the public ac- 
counts, and with attempts to garble and confuse the residue, and, by 
the other parties implicated, with an utter silence which is a confession 
of their guilt. 

Resolved : That the facts and figures already disclosed compel us, as 
they must all honest and reflecting men, to the conclusion that enor- 
mous sums of money have been wrongfully taken from the public 
treasuiy ; that millions of dollars have been paid to a few firms and 
individuals for work never performed and materials never furnished, 
and this with the procurement or connivance of persons now holding 
the principal offices of trust and profit under the present Charter ; that 
exorbitant rents are paid for military armories and offices, and in sev- 
eral instances for rooms which do not exist or are not occupied ; that 
the long and continued concealment of the accounts of the City proper 
furnish ground to believe that these accounts will disclose facts, if pos- 
sible, yet more astounding, and will show that the same men who have 
squandered or stolen hundreds of thousands of the taxpayers' money, 
are still engaged in similar frauds and peculations. 

Besolved : That the piiblic officers directly arraigned at the bar of 
public judgment for these offenses are William M. Tweed, now Com- 
missioner of the Department of Public Works, some time President of 
the former Board of Supervisors, and afterward one of the " Interim " 
Board, who had notoriously a controlling influence in the first of these 
Boards, and shared in the acts of the other ; and who, from his rela- 
tions to parties in whose name bills were presented, and to whom they 
were ordered to be paid, is open to the suspicion not only of having 
planned the swindle, but of having shared the plunder ; Richard B. 
Connolly, the present Comptroller, and A. Oakey Hall, the present 
Mayor, who were not only also members of the " Interim " Board 
which sanctioned the payment of several millions of dollars, contrary 
to law and right, but who also signed the warrants and consented to the 
payments which they confess they had the power to expose, if not to 
arrest ; and unless these officers can meet the charges by other evidence 
and on different pleas than have yet been furnished in their behalf, the 
credit of the City of New York and the material interests of its citizens 
will demand that they quit or be deprived of the offices which they 
have dishonored and the power they are abusing. 

Resolved : That we have a right to and do demand a full and detailed 



ORIGIN OF THE COMMITTEE OF SEVENTY. 339 

exhibit of tlic public receipts and expenditures for the past two years 
and ahalf, and of the real and pretended liabilities of the City and 
County of New York, iucludiafi: its funded and its floating debt. This 
demand is not simply to show whether the men who have used money 
of the city, and created its now enormous debt, can produce vouchers 
or accounts for every payment, or whether the books of the Comp- 
troller were balanced, but what is the total amount .vhich has been 
collected from taxes, received from revenue, and borrowed upon the 
credit of the City ; and what has been done with the money, to whom 
it has been paid, and upon what consideration and pretense, in every 
instance. 

Resolved : That the citizens of the City have also a right to know, 
and arc determined to ascertain, who are and have been on the pay-rolls 
of the City government, what pay they receive, and what services they 
render, as well as who have actually profited by the enormous pay- 
ments of bills or accounts, obviously exceeding any value received by 
the City ; who have been represented by the fictitious names alleged to 
appear in these accounts ; and to what extent any members of the 
present City government are concerned, in real partnerships or under 
fictitious names, in the plunder of the public Treasury. 

Resolved : That any legal remedy which is now available to citizens as 
large to fully ascertain the disclosed frauds charged upon the City or 
County ofllcers, and to recover the money wrongfully taken thereby 
from the Public Treasury, should be resorted to ; and that, if no such 
remedies are found to exist, then the law should be altered so as to en- 
able citizens and taxpayers, under proper restrictions and regulations, 
to call officers entrusted by them with power and money to legal ac- 
count, and to invoke the arm of justice to discover fraud in public 
oflacers, and to prevent or redress the dishonest appropriation of public 
money. 

Resolved : That we appeal to the next Legislature of the State, to re- 
peal the Charter and laws by which the present rulers of the City have 
obtained and perpetuated their power, and to give to the City of New 
York a form of government such as shall be devised or approved by our 
wisest and best citizens, and shall enable us to secure an honest and 
efficient administration of the laws. 

Resolved; That the citizens of this City are earnestly entreated to 
make the reform of tlieir own government the one controlling issue at 
the next election ; to support no man for office and especially for the 
Legislature of the State, no matter what may be his party name, who 
is not known to be both honest and incorruptible, and determined, and 
distinctly pledged, so far as he is able, whatever may be the conse- 
quences, to reform the City of New York ; and that our fellow-citizens 



340 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

throughout the State are entreated to join us in the effort to redress 
evils which concern them hardly less than ourselves. 

Resolved: That the public credit, character and the business interests 
of this great and growing City imperatively demand that iti citizens be 
kept fully and constantly informed of the issue of any public stock, 
bonds, or other evidences of debt, binding the real or personal property 
of the City or its citizens ; and, further, that legal provision should be 
made for preventing any such issue not especially authorized, or ex. 
ceeding the amounts specifically appropriated for that purpose, by 
means, if necessary, of officers to be elected by the people of this City, 
in such manner as to secure the representation of the whole people, 
the minority as well as the majority. 

Resolved : That the thanks of the community are due to the public 
newspapers which have contributed to enlighten the public mind and 
to form and give utterance to public opinion upon these issues ; and 
especially to the New York Times for its fearless and searching inves- 
tigation and exposure of the public accounts and of the conduct of the 
present officers of the City. 

Resolved : That an Executive Committee of seventy members be ap- 
pointed by the president of this meeting, whose duty it shall be to take 
such measures as shall be necessary or expedient to carry out the ob- 
jects for which we are assembled ; to demand a full exhibition of all 
the accounts of the City and County, and an explicit statement of all 
the persons to whom, and the pretenses upon which, the large pay- 
ments of the past two years and a half have been made; to enforce any 
remedies which now exist to obtain this information, if it is refused, 
and to recover whatever sums of money have been fraudulently or feloni- 
ously abstracted ; and also to press upon the Legislature and the Gov- 
ernor of the State such measures of legislation and action as may be 
necessary or proper to enforce the existing laws, and to supply their de- 
fects, and to remove the causes of the present abuses; and, finally, to 
assist, sustain and direct an united effort, by the citizens of New York, 
without reference to party, to obtain a good government and honest 
officers to administer it; and the said committee are hereby authorized 
to call upon all citizens interested in good government to contribute 
such funds as may be needed to execute the powers entrusted to them, 
and also to fill vacancies and add to their number. 

The effect of these resohttions was electrical throughout 
the City, and in a few days led to the next formidable step 
towards the downfall and destruction of the Ring. 



LETTER XXX. 

Marriaoe op Tweed's Daughter— A Seven Hundred Thou- 
sand Dollar Wedding — James Gordon Bennett's Com- 
ment ON It— Opening of the New Americus Club Build- 
ing—Tweed's Gala Day While on the Brink op a 
Volcano— Magnificence op the Tiger's Lair at Green- 
wich, Conn.— Practical Jokers op the Club— Rowing 
Race Between John Fox and "Jake" Somerindyke— 
Simplicity op John Kelly Contrasted with the Sur- 
roundings of his Successor. 

My dear Dean : 

While mentioning, in my preceding letter, some of the 
notable events leading up to the political upheaval of 1871, 
I omitted to mention two occurrences in which the then 
Boss figured; and as these illustrate the lavish display 
incident to overweening pride— which, we are told, " goeth 
before a fall," — and the swagger which too much success 
frequently leads to, perhaps they are worth relating. 

One of these events M^as the regal display made by Tweed 
over the wedding of his daughter. This affair was heralded 
far and wide, and the elaborate preparations for it were dis- 
cussed in the style usual to newspaper announcements of 
"grand social events." The wedding took place on the 
thirty-first day of May, 1871, in Trinity Chapel, West 
Twenty-fifth street, near Broadway ; the same minister, 
Dr. Price, who had married the parents of the bride, and 
who had attended to other matrimonial "jobs" for the 
Tweed family, officiating. The daughter's name was Mary 
Amelia, and she was married to Mr. Arthur Ambrose 
Maginnis, of New Orleans. As I was not honored with an 
invitation to this distinguished social event, I shall let the 

34X 



343 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Xew York Herald of June 2, 1871, tell its story. I quote 
from an editorial in the inimitable style of James Gordon 
Bennett (the elder), which I find in that paper of the date 
mentioned : 

The wedding presents, displayed in a grand show-room, were glorious 
to behold. They represented in cash seven hundred thousand dollars — 
a display of wedding-presents unsurpassed by the collection of the cele- 
brated Oviedo diamond wedding, or of any occasion of the kind, we 
dare say, since the marriage, two or three years ago, of a daughter of the 
Khedive of Egypt, and completely eclipsing the jewelry presents to the 
British Princess Louise, on the occasion of her union with the heir of the 
great Scottish Duke of Argyll. Seven hundred thousand dollars 1 What 
a testimony of the loyalty, the royalty, and the abounding East Indian 
resources of Tammany Hall ! Was there any Democracy to compare 
with thy Democracy, in glory, power, and equal rights, under the sun ? 
Never ! And it is just the beginning of the good time coming. Don't 
talk of Jeff Davis and his absurd Democracy; don't mention the Democ- 
racy of the Paris Commune, as representing true Democratic prin- 
ciples ; but come to the fountain-head of Democracy, the old Wigwam, 
and you will get it there — if you get within the lucky circle of the 
"magic" Ring. There you get into a Democratic placer which gives 
you, witliout the labor of digging, but with some deep diving, the 
pearls of Ceylon, the silver of Mexico, the gold of California, and the 
diamonds of Golconda, South America and Alaska. And they say that, 
by the "rule of three," it all comes out of the Tax Levy, and from the 
abounding blessings of municipal sovereignty and a municipal and a 
munificent emperor, who needs only a crown of brilliants and a throne 
of ivory, surmounted by a golden peacock as large as life, with an out- 
spread tail blazing all over with diamonds, to rise to the Oriental 
splendor of the Great Mogul. 

I will not enter into details regarding the wedding 
further ttan to say that every prominent office-holder of the 
City and State, Republican as well as Democratic, together 
with merchants and financiers, helped to contribute to the 
grandeur of the occasion ; and as among the presents were a 
silver set of two hundred pieces " from father and mother," 
and a bank-book for twenty-five thousand dollars " from 
father," no doubt the heart of the happy father of the 
bride swelled with pride and joy. 

The other event to which I shall refer was the formal 



SPLENDORS OF THE AMERICUS CLUB. 343 

opening of the magniticeut uuw Club TTonso of the Amer- 
icus Club, of which Mr. Tweed was president, on the tenth 
day of June, 1S71, less than two weeks after the great 
wedding. 

The then famous Aniericus Club, which was organized 
for aquatic purpose.^, in 1840, and which gradually drifted 
into a social, convivial, and political institution, was modeled 
after the old English clubs, and its members sought its hos- 
pitalities chiefly in Summer. Its headcpiarters were at Green- 
wich, Connecticut, or, to be more specific, at Indian Neck, 
on the shore of Long Island Sound. There the members 
at first held their camp from June until September 15. In 
the Winter, tho Club gave a grand ball in the city, which 
was always an enjoyable affair ; but the more active mem- 
bers of the Club, during the Fall, Winter and early Spring, 
found their chief fraternal enjoyment at the gathering of 
the noted Blossom Club, chartered in 186i, of which Owen 
W. Brennan was president, composed of congenial spirits, 
most of whom, like Tweed, enjoyed membership in both 
the xVmericus and Blossom Clubs. 

So popular had the Americus Club become that applica- 
tions for admission to its fold poured in from all sides, not- 
withstanding the initiation fee had been advanced to $500 
and that the yearly dues were $200. The Club house and 
grounds as they stood up to the close of the season of 1870, 
with the broad promenade, the " General's camp," the 
handsome library building and other houses, had been 
sacrificed, and a magnificent new building had been erected 
for the use of the Club and its guests, at a cost of $300,000 
— unquestionably one of the finest establishments of this 
kind in the world. 

The building was L-shaped, each wing being 180 feet 
long and 32 feet wide, and at the end of each wing was a 
tower 130 feet in height. The parlors were on the. main 
floor, one of them, 90 by 32 feet in dimensions, being really 



344 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

one of the finest rooms in the country, while the reception- 
room, known as " Tweed^s Den," was gorgeously gotten up. 
The sleeping-rooms above were furnished with black wal- 
nut, and the adjoining parlors with rosewood and reps. 
The floors were carpeted with velvet medallion, and a piazza 
sixteen feet wide surrounded the house, the view from all 
parts of which was romantic and enchanting. A grand 
dining hall, 100 feet long and 30 feet wide, was situated east 
of the main building; and the Club House and all its 
surroundings were fit for use, Summer or Winter. 

The Americus Club owned several yachts and two or 
three small steamboats, the latter being chiefly employed 
in conveying jnembers and guests between ISTew York City 
and the camping-ground, while the yachts were used for 
pleasure excursions of guests who enjoyed a spanking 
breeze and a spin on the ocean wave. Tweed was for 
several years connected with the Americus Club, but it 
reached the culmination of its glory about the same period 
that he reached his, in June, 18T1, at which time he was 
as much its central orb as is Boss Croker to-day the cen- 
tral orb of the New York Democratic Club. 

There was, of course, at the opening a grand gathering 
of notabilities and satellites, and a spread of good things, 
gotten up " regardless of expense." Tweed was the recip- 
ient of congratulations on every side ; and, from his stand- 
point, no doubt, he felt much elated, although I cannot but 
think that a man of his experience and intelligence must 
have discerned threatening symptoms of the coming storm. 
But, having thus far overcome every obstacle which had beset 
his path, and having through legislation fixed everything 
for a five years' reign of " peace and prosperity," he no 
doubt enjoyed the gala day, and probably felt that he could 
afford to treat with contempt all public criticism of his acts 
and those of his associates. 

The entertainments at the Club House during the season 



PRANKS OF TIIH IMIACTICAL JOKKRS. 345 

of 1S70 liiul been on a scale of princely munificence, cost-* 
ing, it was estimated, not less than fifty thousand dollars. 
The average number of guests was not less than one hun- 
dred, all partaking gratuitously of the hos]iitalities of the 
Club. Every distinguished Democrat who happened to 
visit the metropolis during the sea-shore season received at 
Tweed's hands a cordial invitation to ])artake of the hospi- 
talities of the Americus Club, nor was this invitation con- 
fined to the Democrats alone. Ilis Republican confreres 
of the Legislature, as well as E,epu])lican officials of the city 
were very frequently Mr. Tweed's guests at Indian Neck. 

But when Tweed fell, the Americus Club collapsed ; its 
glory departed ; yet the many pleasant associations con- 
nected with it are, to this day, discussed by those who par- 
ticipated in them ; and an amusing joke, said to have 
been played on ex-Congressman John Fox, now Vice-Presi- 
dent, I think, of the New York Democratic Club, is still 
relished in political circles. 

Toward the close of a Summer day, in 18T0, the 
Americus Club House was crowded with members and 
guests, all of whom were having a jolly time, and everyone 
felt in good humor and ready for any fun that happened to 
develop. Almost every man likes to think, or have 
others .think, that he can swim, sail, fish and row — four 
things which really few men can do very well, and which 
therefore every man tries to convince ever}' other man he 
can do better than most other men. John Fox (who, by the 
way, is one of the very few politicians I have known who, 
after many years' service in public life, having been Con- 
gressman, Supervisor and State Senator, has escaped cal- 
umny) was not an exception to this almost universal rule, 
and, finding that there was a good deal of boasting going 
on as to how this or that one could handle an oar, he joined 
in the game of brag. Eugene Durnin, a jolly good fellow 
— not long since passed away — somewhat to Fox's surprise, 



34(j THIRTY YEARS OF JSfEVV YORK POLITICS. 

seemed to become, in the course of conversation, convinced 
tliat Fox could row, and finally offered to bet that he could 
beat " Jake ' ' Somerindyke, a noted sport, in a rowing 
match, which bet was taken up by Owen Brennan, another 
jolly good fellow, in behalf of "Jake " Somerindyke ; and 
so, to hhck up the men who had backed them up, Fox and 
Somerindyke agreed, for the sport of the thing, to row 
against each other the next afternoon. 

There was feverish excitement in and around the Club 
House the next day, and after going through all prelimi- 
naries incident to a contest, the race came off. John Fox 
was in capital trim, had an excellent boat, and rowed vigor- 
ously ; yet, somehow, he did not seem to propel his boat to 
satisfy himself. He tugged at the oars ; he sweated like an 
ox ; he would have sworn — had he not at that time been a 
Tammany man in good standing. But the boat did not 
make the time he had evidently expected. Perhaps he had 
expected too much, and had not made due allow- 
ance for the state of the tide. " It's a devil of a fiood-tide, 
ain't it ? " he called out from his boat to his opponent, 
Somerindyke, who yelled back, " I find it so here ; " and 
"Jake " seemed to tug as vigorously at the oars as did John, 
but not so vainly ; for Somerindyke beat Fox badly. 

It was declared by Fox's friends to be "-too bad ; but it 
was the fate of war," and Durnin, who had lost, told Fox 
" it was the devilish tide," and not to be discouraged — he 
would do better next time; then Durnin promptly paid 
over to Brennan the amount staked on Fox. As the money 
was changing hands. Fox detected a roguish look exchanged 
between the two. This perplexed him ; in fact, there was 
something about the whole affair which bothered him. 
Why should his boat have dragged so heavily through the 
water ? The tide had not been against him, but in his favor, 
as he had since ascertained. His defeat was not, then, 
attributable to the water; and he had certainly pulled liia 



01)1) HAIT FOR H1.1*F.F1SII. 34'? 

best, and the l)():it looked all ri^^ht. After all, could anv- 
tliinff have been the matter with the boat t Could it have 
been tampered with? Fox said nothin«;-, but he "did a 
power of thinhin«r." At nii;ht, when uol)ody was around 
and the race liad been partly forgotten, Fox went down to 
the dock aud, liauling in the little boat which he had used 
in the match with Somerindyke, examined it carefully. 
He found, what he had by this time strongly suspected, that 
" a job had been put up." His boat had been " skagged," 
as it was termed— that is, a piece of wood had been nailed 
crosswise to the keel. All was now explained. No wonder 
the boat's speed had not satisfied him ; no wonder he had 
tugged and sweated to no purpose, and laid his lack of 
progress to the tide. Then Fox hauled in and inspected 
the little boat which his opponent had used, and found that 
it was all right ; it had not been " skagged." 

Fox now understood everything. Somerindyke had only 
pretended to tug at his oars, to keep up the illusion of a 
strong tide, and the well-planned joke. And Durnin (Fox 
was now well satisfied) was at the bottom of the whole 
thing ; had " put up the job," and made a bet on Fox for a 
blind, being willing to lose his bet for the fun of the thing; 
and Fox was further convinced that " all the gang " had 
been let into the joke and had " got the laugh on him," 
Usually a pretty good fellow and one who could stand a 
joke, Fox just now was a little annoyed, not relishing 
the situation. Meeting Durnin, he made a wild dash for 
the offender, and friends had all they could do to prevent a 
personal encounter, which both men would have regretted, 
for they were always genial companions. Fox determined, 
nevertheless, to keep a rod in pickle for Durnin ; and when, 
one day, they were members of a party out on a hunt for 
blue fish, Fox was alert to get even, if he could. Durnin 
y)rided himself on his fishing and his perfect knowledge of 
all that appertained thereto, and especially was he an expert 



3-48 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

at blue fishing. But on tins particular occasion, it was Lis 
fishing that made Durnin " blue," not his fish ; for, although 
he arranged his lines with the utmost skill, fixed his out- 
riggers, and all that, and although he hauled in with a proud 
sense of triumph every time, yet he hauled in, not blue fish, 
but empty bottles which Fox and the rest of the crowd 
managed to attach to Durnin's line while he went, every 
now and then, below deck to " wet his whistle." There is 
a way of attaching a bottle to the end of a line, tying it 
round the neck, centre and bottom, so as to make its motion 
at the end of the line produce precisely the same "feel" 
at the other end as a blue fish would. Three separate times 
did Fox and his companions fool Durnin in this way, each 
time Durnin thinking, " Well, there is no more fooling this 
time," and of course he got the laugh " dead against him," 
and Fox was avenged. 

It was in the pursuit of such practical jokes that some of 
the members of the Araericus Club managed to kill time 
and enjoy their recreation season at Indian Neck. 

During the period of John Kelly's reign as Boss of 
Tammany Hall, he indulged in no extravagance. He had 
no Club house, with its expensive appendages. lie occupied 
two small rooms in the rear of the second floor of JSTo. 117 
Nassau street, as business offices, for the purpose of closing 
up his affairs connected with the Shrievalty, and those who 
wished to consult him could either see him there or at 
certain hours in the conference room at Tammany Hall. 

Under the reign of Boss Croker, there is an imitation 
of the Americus Club grandeur, in the Democratic Club 
of this City, which occupies a spacious building on Fifth 
avenue, in a fashionable section, not far removed from the 
Vanderbilts, the Astors, the Goelets, and other " well-fixed " 
families. This club now numbers among its members 
almost every Judge, Congressman, Senator and other Demo 
cratic office-holder in the metropolis, together with every- 



BOSS CKOKEU AS AN INSl'lUKU OF TIIIUST. 34!) 

body else who is looking for recoijfiiition from the existin^^ 
Boss. 

Less than two years ago this Club was being conducted 
more as a social than a political institution, sustained by 
gentlemen of Democratic athliations, and comparatively few 
otiice-holders were numbered among its members. No sooner, 
however, was it known that Mr. Oroker had become interested 
in the Club, tiiauallthe satellites of that great political or!) 
flocked to its membership roll, and very soon Mr. Croker and 
his friends were in control. E.\-Governor Flower, its then 
president, became a withered rose, and although Judge Truax, 
of the Supreme Court Bench, is now president, the " Boss," 
when present, is the central figure every night in the Club, 
and when he moves, the minor nmltitude moves with him. 
As an instance, I may mention that not long ago Mr. Croker 
was sitting in the parlor of the Club, conversing with Mayor 
A"an Wyck and James W. Boyle, and the smoking-room 
or cafe was almost deserted ; no business was being done. 
*' This will never do," said John F. Carroll, Mr. Croker's 
right-hand man, '* we'll have to take the benefit of the bank- 
rupt act if Mr. Croker does not soon visit the smoking-room," 
and Mr. Carroll jokingly told Mr. Croker what he had said. 
The Boss took the hint, invated his two companions to 
join him in the smoking-room, and no sooner was he seated 
at one of the tables than the crowd swept out of the parlor, 
and soon every table in the smoking-room was occupied by 
men who only a short time before had forgotten that they 
ever drank or handled a cigar; and as clouds of smoke 
rolled up to the elaborately decorated Democratic ceiling, 
and the merry clinking of glasses' was heard, Carroll 
gave Croker a wink, and said, " I told you so ! " while the 
Boss serenely nodded his approval as he called for another 
fifty cent cigar. 

Subserviency to Bossism, I regret to say, is even greater 
now than it was at the time of Mr. Croker's first " illustrious 



350 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

predecessor," when the present Boss, then an humble Al- 
derman, was legislated out of office by the original Demo- 
cratic " Club" mau, through the Charter of 1870. 



LETTEK XXXL 

How THE Ring Humbugged the Proud American Citizen— A 
Great I\Iokal Convulsion in the Air— Serious Talk at a 
Secret Conclave— Suggestion of a New York Vigi- 
lance Committee— Experimental Appeal to a Corrupt 
Judge First to be Tried— His Unexpected Granting of a 
Sweeping Injunction— Unsuccessful Effort to Make a 
Jonah of "Slippery Dick"— Zigzag Fight and Mayor 
Hall's Topsy-Turviness— Business Men's Rally to Oust 
THE Municipal Thieves. 

My dear Dean : 

The people of tlie City of Kew York, in their aggregate 
capacity, are an unusually sensible and orderly community, 
and have on many occasions exhibited strong qualities of 
forbearance and sober reflection in the midst of great moral 
convulsions and under circumstances which in other dense 
centres of population, especially in Europe, might have led 
to violence and bloodshed. Whenever I have seen the 
great bulk of New York's population practically frown 
down any attempt at violent disturbance, as 1 have on sev- 
eral occasions, I cannot but believe that this steadiness of 
purpose to discountenance any proceeding subversive of law 
and order has its birth and sustenance in universal suffrage. 

Despite the existence of Bossism every thoughtful Amer- 
ican citizen is conscious that the people here exercise sover- 
eign power. They know that their votes can make or unmake 
rulers. Every citizen worthy of the name, no matter how 
liumble his station in life, feels that his right of suffrage gives 
hiui an equal voice wHh the millionaire in forming the gov- 
ernment of the State or City, lie may be duped and 
he may err, but opportunities speedily recur for retrieval. 

351 



S52 TlimTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

When election day comes, every man with an honest bal- 
lot in liis hand is a sovereign. The mechanic and the mer- 
chant, the hod-carrier and the millionaire, the man of letters 
and the man of law, the dealer in spirits and the 
spiritnal director, the boot-black and the dude, the scaven- 
ger and the sport, the bar-tender and the bum, stand side by 
side at the polls to exercise the sovereign and sacred right 
of hereditary freemen in choosing those who are to admin- 
ister the government for them, not as their masters, but as 
their servants. This is what makes an American citizen 
proud. This is what makes him stamp down every attempt 
to disturb the order and system of which he himself is an 
integral part . 

The gigantic thefts by the Ring were particularly exas- 
perating at the time they were discovered, and the sudden 
disclosure one day that millions had been stolen from the 
City Treasury was provocative of the deepest agitation. 

Let us look at the conditions under which this untoward 
calamity burst upon them. The City had then a population 
of nine hundred thousand. For five years the taxes had 
been inordinately high, each succeeding year steadily in- 
creasing tlie burden. Many were the murmurs of discon- 
tent, but they were temporarily silenced by magnificent and 
misleading messages of Mayors, florid and dishonest reports 
of Departments, eloquent and deluding speeches from ora- 
tors, and various other devices of skilled politicians. So it 
went on until the early Fall of 1870, when the taxes ap- 
peared to have taken an unusually strong upward tendency. 
Then it became necessary to do something in order to keep 
the voters in line for the forthcoming Democratic ticket. 
To this end the great Tammany demonstration of October 
27, 1870, described in a previous letter, was planned, with 
Seymour, Hoffman, Tilden, and other great lights drummed 
into the service, so as to blind the voters to everything but 
the glory of the Democratic party and the proud privilege 



SERIOUS TALK AT A SECRET CONCLAVE. 353 

it was, even tliough expensive, to be eligible to fellowshii) 
therein. So far, apparently, from crediting the accusations 
of wrong-doing publicly alleged against those who were con- 
ducting their municipal alfairs, the citizens generously 
voted them a new lease of power. And now, a few months 
thereafter, they were startled with the disclosure that many 
millions had been stolen from their Treasury, even after the 
vulgar manner of a forger or a burglar, by those whom they 
had favored and honored, and that, besides, there were prob- 
ably many millions more of fraudulent claims which they 
must saddle— all of which threatened fatal disturbance to 
business, depreciation to real estate, suspension to enter- 
prise, bankruptcy to the City, and ruin and poverty to thou- 
sands. Men felt that their rcaV estate, the accumulation of 
vears, was slipping away from them; merchants saw, or 
thought they saw, an approaching paralysis in business ; the 
small trader, the hard-working and thrifty mechanic, the 
deft artisan, the insecure laborer, in fact, all, in every ave- 
nue of trade and commerce and employment, realized that a 
severe crisis was at hand. Yet there was no evidence of 
anything further than a great moral convulsion. The people 
generally, having heard so much of the efhcacy of their 
laws and institutions, and knowing so little of the nature or 
extent of the plunderers' stronghold, reasoned that the 
thieves would be easily arrested and sent to prison like other 
malefactors. 

But there were a few men who looked further and could 
see how difficult was the task of even checking, not to speak 
of ending, the career of the plunderers. 

On the night following the memorable meeting at the 
Cooper Union on the 4th of Sept., 1871, eight prominent 
citizens met secretly by appointment at an uptown hotel to 
consider the phases of the situation. There was John Cobert, 
an extensive real estate owner and one of the heaviest 
taxpayers of the city ; Joseph W. llazlen, a successful and 



354 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

wealthy lawyer; R. A. Hunter, a banker ; James Whitten, 
the President of a Life Insurance Company ; James T. 
Walter, a retired merchant ; Isidor Sendleberg, a large man- 
ufacturer and real estate owner; George T. Benster, a 
former Judge and a lawyer of high standing. The name or 
business of the eighth gentleman present, I have not been 
able to ascertain. 

It is difficult to believe it, at this distance of time, 
but the purpose of several of those who assembled, and 
who went behind closed doors, was the formation of a Vigi- 
lance Committee on the lines which governed a similar body 
in San Francisco, in 1849, which, whether its methods were 
right or wrong, drove from that City the bands of thugs, 
thieves and robbers, who had infested and terrorized the 
community. 

Doubtless you have observed, my dear Dean, how liable 
we are to be deceived by the appearance and ordinary man- 
ners of men ; how those who are of a quiet, calm and con- 
servative temperament in the everyday concerns of life, 
often become the most emotional in times of excitement ; 
while, equally often, the mercurial nature, which boils up 
in commotion over trivial incide^its, is subdued and awed 
in the presence of portentous movements. The meeting 
on the 5th of September, 1871, at the uptown hotel in this 
City gave an example of this. 

No man had a higher character for integrity, self-poise 
and peaceful methods, in all of his relations in life since he 
had begun to practice his profession twenty years before, 
than lawyer Joseph W. Hazlen. Yet Mr. Ilazlen, in speak- 
ing to the suggestion that extreme measures be adopted 
(which meant hanging to lamp posts, or other convenient 
scaffolds, the four chief malefactors together with three or 
four Judges) addressed the following words to his seven 
anxious companions : 



J.YNCHING PROJECTS DISCUSSED. 855 

"Where else cau you turu for a reiiudy? They hold everything 
within their grasp. Every head of Department in our City is their 
creature. Every employe of our government is their slave. Fifteen 
thousaTul hirelings, who never perform work, and indeed who have no 
work to perform, are on the City pay-roll, as a pnctorian guard around 
the Chief Boss, to do any act or deed he may command. Can you 
stop this waste of your money ? Can you draw back the hands that 
are now plunged up to the armpits in the Treasury ? Can you stop 
Tweed, cau you stop Connolly, can you stop Hall, can you stop 
Sweeny, can you stop the coterie of favorite contractors all dripping 
with the wealth that they have stolen from you and from me ? Can 
you go to the Crand Jury, which is tilled with their tools ? Can you 
go to the District Attorney, who is their pliant servant ? Can you 
obtain protection from the police, who are these men's bodyguard ? 
Can 3^ou call upon the Governor of the State, who extols the virtues of 
Tweed, the purity of Hall, the brains of Sweeny and the charming 
simplicity of Connolly ? Can you, in fine, appeal to our Courts ? If 
so, where ? (ict an order from some honest Judge — Barnard will 
vacate it. Get another — Cardozo will vacate it. Get a third, and In- 
graham will ' modify ' it. (This last hit provoked a smile.) Appeal, 
and the General Term will, in turn, sustain Barnard and Cardozo and 
Ingraham — who compose the General Term ! Appeal in such case to 
the Court of Appeals, and by the machinery of the Courts in this City 
that appeal will be hampered and delayed, and long before the case 
will reach that tribunal, the City will be in financial ruin." 

Coming from Mr. Hazlen, such words liad a profound 
effect on those assembled, and a painful silence followed. 
At length former Judge Benster arose, his face pale with 
thought, and, after a considerable pause, began : 

" While I cannot for a moment sanction the slightest departure from 
legal and constitutional proceedings in this grave matter, it is difficult 
to resist being impressed with the array of damning facts presented by 
Mr. Hazlen, than whom none is ordinarily more conservative. lie 
must, indeed, be deeply moved when he gives utterance to sentiments 
so foreign to his natural instincts. When he has been thus disturbed 
from his usual calmuess, it shows on what a volcano we stand. But, 
whi'e I cannot gainsay much that has been urged by him, I am still a 
believer in the irresistible force inherent in our legal and political sys- 
tem. Wiiatever way, under God, we may be rescued, it must be by 
the law, or we will only add to our disgrace, not to say worse. At all 
events, let ug first have recourse to the law, before even a whisper is 



856 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

heard that men of thought and education and high standin f in the 
community have lost faith in the efhcacy of our institutions." 

This wise utterance had a marked effect, even upon Mr. 
Hazlen himself and others who thought with hin., when 
Mr. Walter, who had been retired from business for some 
years, said : 

" About twenty -two years ago, I was a mfcinLei of the Vigilance 
Committee in San Francisco. It was an organization formed without 
the sanction of law ; in fact, it was in violation of law, yet it accom- 
plished there what the people were unable to effect in any other way. 
We really had no law to aid us against the band of thieves and cut- 
throats who robbed and even murdered. But here we have laws 
which, if enforced, give us ample remedy." 

Then Mr. Whitten spoke : 

"It is true that we have laws, but, as observed by Mr. Hazlen, the 
Courts refuse to enforce them. Then our remedy is clearly against the 
Judges who refuse. In two months from now will come an elec- 
tion for Members of the Legislature, Let us bend all our efforts to 
agitate for the election of Members of the Legislature who will im- 
peach, next Winter, the corrupt Judges of this City and remove them 
from office. Let us give of our means and our time to accomplish this 
great work. In the meantime, let application be made to the Courts 
for injunctions and other remedies to tie the hands of the plunderers, 
and let the Judge or Judges who refuse the demands of the people to 
protect their property, and who have already degraded the Bench, be 
dealt with as they deserve." 

This course was determined on and the gentlemen 
separated. 

Speaking of the suggestion of a Vigilance Committee, 
the following editorial from an ably edited paper, The 
Nation, of September 2, 1871, is ample evidence that such 
a proceeding was uppermost in the minds of many citizens 
at that time : 

The World, we are sorry to see, was a good deal shocked by our 
views on a Vigilance Committee, apropos of Hall, Connolly, Tweed and 
Co., expressed last week, and seems to think we desire to see these 
gentlemen "lynched." "Lynching" is, however, here a question- 
begging term. What we say is that, in our opinion, Hall, Connolly, 



UaHNAUDS sweeping IN.IUXt'TlON. 357 

'I'wced, Barnard, and all the class to wliicli they belong, and oT which 
i.ouis Napoleon was the most conspicuous member, fear no penalty for 
their misdeeds except a violent death. They are indifferent to public 
opinion and have matters so arranged that the prison pen has no terrors 
for them, and a natural death they calculate on. But the prospect of a 
violent death, whicii would .suddenly stop their elianipagne, knock the 
satin sofas fron\ under them, .shut out tiie velvet carpets from their 
view, cau.se their fast horses to vanish into thin air, and launch them 
into the cold unknown, would terrify Iheni exceedingly ; and such a 
death, we repeat, a large and growing body of respectable citizens think 
they ought to die — first and foremost, in order to stop their thieving 
and rid the community of them, and secondly, to prevent an unwhole- 
some influence on public and private morals of the spectacle of the 
peaceful close of their career in the enjoyment of their stealings. 

The way in which good citizens justify' this view of their deserts, is 
the way in which they justify all revolts against uusupportabletj'ranny, 
and all inflictions of punishment on persons who have grossly abused 
power for the injury of their fellow citizens, and against whom the law 
affords no redress. But where they err, in our opinion, is in supposing 
that justice can be done on Tweed and his associates through what is 
commonly called Vigilance Committee. An appeal to force, in New 
York, would mean civil war ; and those who talk of appealing to force 
must make up their minds to civil war, and must be prepared for some 
lighting. Should they succeed in securing the persons" of the malefac- 
tors, and in bringing them to punishment, their act will, however, be 
no more lynching than the execution of Iiol)espierre and Rigault was 
lynching. It might be called high-handed or cruel, or remorseless, or 
various other things, but it would have in it a .solemnity which in 
Lynch law is wanting. 

On the morning of the '7th of September, two da^'s after 
the meeting which discussed the formation of a Vigilance 
Committee, former Judge George C. Barrett, who had 
been six years Judge of the Common Pleas of this City, 
and who was only retired from that Bench a year, and who 
lias been since 1873 a Justice of the Supreme Court, walked 
into the Supreme Court, armed with a pile of legal docu- 
ments, and boldly demanded from Judge Barnard a sweep- 
ing injunction, tying up almost the entire machinery of the 
City government. 

The suit he had on hand was brought in the name of 



358 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

John Foley, a taxpayer, on behalf of himself and the other 
taxpayers of the city. The complaint in substance alleged 
that $30,000,000 were raised by taxation within the year, 
and that this sum was more than sufficient to pay the cur- 
rent expenses of the City government, and yet that the City 
officials were still raising and threatening to raise large ad- 
ditional sums on the bonds and stocks of the City. The 
documents presented gave an array of doings not sanctioned 
by law, and showed that claims had been paid and others 
were about to be paid without proper and legal audit, and 
asked for an injunction against the Comptroller to restrain 
any further payments of money until the validity of these 
payments should be established and properly and legaay 
audited. 

Ex-Judge Barrett, although his application was ex-parte, 
was permitted to make a lengthened argument, to which 
Judge Barnard listened, not only with patience, but with 
attention. The news of the application spread rapidly to 
the corridors, and then to various Departments of the City 
Government, and inside of a few minutes the Court room 
was crowded with anxious politicians. Most of them mut- 
tered their surprise that Judge Barnard would listen so at- 
tentively to the " treasonable " language of ex-Judge Barrett, 
and that the papers were iv^^t flung back in Barrett's face 
long before. Barnard listening so respectfully, too, while 
Barrett talked of the apparent frauds of high officials ; what 
could it mean '1 " Oh ! but wait till he gets at them," whis- 
pered a man with a husky voice. " Yes," said his neigh- 
bor, '' but did you hear the question he asked Barrett?" 
" That's all right, but that's only to throw him down the 
harder," rejoined the man with the husky voice. 

But Judge Barrett, warming to his subject, became more 
aggressive ; in fact, he was very bold in voice and manner. 
What was then in Judge Barrett's mind ? Ordinarily, he 
knew, he could expect no justice from Barnard in such a 



Tlir, RING TANUl.ED AND TIKI) 11'. 350 

case. Was his attitude one of lueiuice to a man wlunn ho 
l.elieved to be a great wrongdoer, and was he gambling that 
]?arnard wouhl weaken before an aroused piibhc conscience ; 
or liad he an intimation that Barnard was informed of tlie 
secret meeting at the uptown hotel and of the determina- 
tion to trv, as a first remedy, to oljtain an injunction from 
the Court, and that, on its refusal, some other action would 
be taken ^ However this may be, Judge Barnard was 
wrapped in grave thought as Judge Barrett proceeded with 
liis crushing array of facts and figures ; and at the close of the 
argument. Judge Barnard, instead of taking the papers (as 
is customary) for examination and consideration, promptly 
said : " The facts presented warrant an injunction. I will 
grant the order." 

Those assembled were astounded, and evidenced their 
surprise according to their feelings of delight or dismay. 
Perhaps the most surprised of all was Judge Barrett him- 
self, although he did not show it then. Out into the corri- 
dors, out into the street, everywhere, in public oftice, private 
oftices and business hous s, the information spread like a 
prairie fire, that the wheels of the City government were 
tied up and clogged by a great spike from Judge Barnard's 
pen. Tlie atmosphere around the City Hall was in a fer- 
ment. Ofiice-holders, high and low, rushed towards each 
other, and asked, what was the matter with Barnard, to 
grant such an order. Some denounced him, some muttered 
curses, some said nothing, but each looked as if he had just 
heard of a sudden death in his family. Everything was 
disorder, worriment and dismay. A confidential official in 
the Finance Department rushed over to Tweed and asked 
him to explain. "I can't understand it," said Tweed; 
''Barnard and myself were together last night, and we 
talked over matters." That was all. AVas he at the bottom 
of it ? Or was it Hall ? Or was it Sweeny ? 

Judge Cardozo was asked about it. He shook his head 



360 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and blushed for Barnard. Mayor Hall was sought, and he 
said, flippantly, " Nonsense ! Not a word of truth in it. 
Romance ! Is it really a fact ? "Well, then, 'tis one of 
Judge Barnard's stereotyped jokes. Foley and Barrett 
think they will plant the nettle of danger in the Court 
House, but from what I know of farming, I think we shall 
pluck the flower of safety from it." After a pause he con- 
tinued: "This will give us a dignified opportunity to make 
a full response to the romancing on that subject in the 
papers." Then he became very grave, as he proceeded ; 

" The object of this movement is far reaching. Jones of the TYmes 
visited General Grant [then President of the United States] at Long 
Branch, and a client of mine heard Jones say, on the Long Branch boat, 
that they were going to throw our Municipal Government here into 
chaos, so as to lay the foundation for calling upon the General Govern- 
ment to upset us here, and appoint a Provisional Mayor, as they 
appoint Military Governors in the South. But I will, in spite of all, 
fill out my term — I have a year and a half yet to serve— and I will be a 
candidate for re-election." 

That afternoon Comptroller Connolly, who tried to look 
cheerful, was asked : " Have you been served with the in- 
junction papers?" Connolly (trying to think a moment) 
" Oh, yes, but I sent them over to the Corporation Counsel 
without reading them. That's what I always do with these 
little things." [Slippery Dick !J 

Tweed next day held an imposing levee at his oflice in 
the Public Works Department. Judges, Congressmen, 
Senators, Assemblymen, Aldermen, bedecked with great 
diamonds, assembled to do him special homage, so as to 
emphasize their unshaken confidence in him. 

The manner in which Tweed received news of Barnard's 
injunction is thus told in the New York Sun of September 
9th, 18T1 : 

He (Tweed) looked quite delighted when he saw the Sun reporter. 
His bright large eyes sparkled, when he said, in his cordial, frank man- 
ner, " How are you '? Glad to see you." 

Reporter: I am sorry to interrupt you. 



TWEED IN HOMICIDAL MOOD. 361 

Mr. Tweed: Not lit all, we were just tiilkiug about the iujunetiou. 

Reporter : What do you think of the matter, Mr. Tweed V 

Mr. Tweed : Oh, I don't think it can stand ; it was just served 

on me. 

Reporter : Have you read the paper ? Tlie application was very 

ably prepared. 

Mr. Tweed: Oh, any man can do that. We liad no notice of it 
whatever, you know. 

I\epv)rter : You don't seem to be very much downcast ? 

Mr. Tweed, hmghing : I, pooh! I am not afraid. What do I 
care? They'll timl me here. 

Reporter : I saw Geor.^e Jones (editor of tlie N. Y. Times) yesterday; 
he feels rather exulting about it? 

Mr. Tweed (contemptuously) : Yes, I suppose he doe?. They think 
it's a good thing, probably. 1 would have fought out this thing differ- 
ently, if I had been alone (with emphasis) ; yes, sir, I wouldn't have 
been so quiet, I can tell you. 

Reporter : Did you read the NatioJi 9 

Mr. Tweed : No. 

Reporter : Y'ou know they are going to have you hanged ? 

Mr. Tweed : He's an infamous liar. The man that wrote thai 
knows he told a lie, and that he wouldn't dare to tell me so to my face 
(After a pause). I was born in New Y^ork, and I mean to stay here, too. 

Reporter : Y^ou don't seem to be afraid of a violent death. Are you ? 

3Ir. Tweed (stamping his foot) : Well, if they want to come, I'll 
be there. That's all I have to say about it, I'll be there, I'll be there, 
sir (with a smile). The Times has been saying all the time I have no 
brains. Well, I'll .show Jones that I have brains. You know, if a man 
is with others he must do as they do. If I had been alone, he wouid 
have a good time of it. But, you know, if a man is with others he must 
take care not to do a rash act. It would hurt them all, you know. 

Reporter : What do you think of repealing the Charter ? 

Mr. Tweed : Well, if they can show us that the people want to 
have it repealed, we'll repeal it; but I don't believe they do. I tell you, 
sir, if this man Jones had said the things he has said about me, twenty- 
five years ago he wouldn't be alive now. But, you see, when a man 
has a wife and children he can't do such a thing (clenching his fists). I 
would have killed him. 

Oil September 22, 1871, a couple of weeks after tlie 
great meeting in the Cooper Uiiion and the granting of the 
injunction by Barnard, Tweed was honored and gratified by 
niany manifestations of confidence from his friends. Amon^ 



362 THIRXr YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the many complimentary resolutions tendered him was one 
from the Central Tweed Club, which was formally presented 
and read to him by Randolph Guggenheimer, who headed 
a delegation from the Club. Mr. Guggenheimer is at the 
present time the President of the Municipal Council of 
Greater New York. The resolution was as follows : 

Resolved: "That we unanimously and emphatically reiterate our 
firm and unabated confidence in the personal and oflScial integrity of thu 
Hon. Wm. ]\I. Tweed, and hereby pledge to him our undivided and 
determined support, hoping and believing that he will emerge with 
honor from the clamor of abuse and detraction which at this time calum- 
niate his name." 

Following up their first advantage, the leaders of the 
Committee of Seventy sought, as the next best move on the 
chessboard, to divide the Ring and create dissensions among 
its members. It was slyly intimated that, at least, Connolly 
should resign the Comptrollership, in order to appease the 
public, he having custody of the public funds. But Con- 
nolly refused to be made a scapegoat. There was a meet- 
ing of the Ring — Tweed, Sweeny, Hall and Connolly. All 
looked anxious and careworn. Hall's sweetest sophistry 
was tried on Connolly. It was pointed out to him that his 
resignation would relieve the strain, and he was promised 
anything else in their gift " after a little while." But Con- 
nolly was obdurate. When the programme leaked out, his 
followers clustered about him in strong numbers and bade 
him stick to the last. 

This tension continued for three days, when an event 
occurred which again startled New York. On Monday 
evening, September 11, the Comptroller's ofBce was broken 
into, and a large number of vouchers and Comity warrants 
were feloniously abstracted. William Murphy, the night 
watchman, went uptown to supper ; when he returned the 
deed had been done. 

This settled Connolly, in the judgment of Hall ; and the 
next day he wrote Connolly, asking for his resignation, 



TRYiyr, TO UNLOAD " SLIPPERY DICK." 363 

XTikUt Hic I'iiviiiiistaiu'os, lie surely could not refuse now ^ 
But he (lid ; and what is more, he implii'd, if lie did not 
openly charge, that Hall liad [)lanned the l)uri2;lai'y in order 
tt) force liini out. Connolly explained that the niissing- 
vouchers and warrants were not necessary to any investiga- 
tion into the affairs of liis department, or to the establish- 
ment of any fact in a Court of law, because duplicates of 
them were kept in the Broadway Bank. Next day there 
was another meeting of the members of the Ring. Con- 
nolly was urged again to resign, by Hall and Sweeny, but 
not by Tweed, who suspected that, if Connolly went by the 
Board, he himself would go next. He had learned that 
llall and Sweeny, the night before had been in consulta- 
tion with Tilden and Belmont. Hall and Sweeny were 
considered the " respectable " mem])ers of the Ring, whose 
best endeavors could not check the rapacity of Tweed and 
Connolly. Tilden and Belmont wished to hush up tlie 
scandal, " for the good of the party " all over the country ; 
immolation of the two arch-plunderers (Tweed and Con- 
nolly) upon the altar of public indignation would be satis- 
factory to these statesmen, and then, of course, to every, 
body. So Tweed looked askance, and did not bring the 
great force of his persuasive powers on Connolly to resign. 
Failing in persuasive eloquence, Hall now began to threaten 
Connolly with all sorts of things. Whereupon, Connolly 
lost his temper, so far as " Slippery Dick " could lose it, 
and told his associates that they were " all in the same boat," 
and they must sink or swim together. 

Now came rumors and counter-rumors of indictments. 
Judge Barnard had another opportunity of doing some fine 
work. An application was made to modify the great in- 
junction, which he did in some respects, to allow payments 
to employees of the City government, and other matters, 
but in his opinion no made wliat was intended as a crushing 
denunciation of Connolly, which was as much as to say : 



364 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

"If this does not drive him out, nothing will." For some 
reason he also gave a broadside to Hall. No one could 
very well understand this zigzag fight. At one time, Hall, 
Tweed and Sweeny against Connolly ; then Tweed partly 
siding against Hall and Sweeny ; then Barnard, Tweed's 
former factotum, assailing Connolly and to a degree. Hall, 
leaving Tweed and Sweeny, so to speak, on top. !No one 
knew what this meant, or the cause of it, except perhaps 
the shrewd manipulators of the Committee of Seventy — 
Tilden, O'Conor, Peckham, Barrett and others, whose policy 
was to " divide and conquer." 

With all his cleverness, Judge Barnard was used like a 
manikin by the brainy men who directed the movements 
against the Ring. Indeed, he was now termed by some 
newspapers in their interest " a fearless and incorrupti))le 
Judge." One year later, these same men and these 
same newspapers procured his impeachment, removal 
and disgrace. Connolly, now driven to bay, made 
such a flank movement to circumvent his enemies, as to 
fully justify the name of " Slippery Dick." He sought 
William F. Havemeyer, chairman of the Committee of 
Seventy, and together they went to Mr. Tildeu's house. 
Andrew II. Green was sent for. Then and there certain 
documents were prepared, one removing Deputy Comp- 
troller Storrs, the other appointing Andrew H. Green 
Deputy Comptroller for four months. Green went to 
Judge Barbour's house and took the oath of office. On the 
following Monday morning, September 18, 1871, Andrew 
H. Green took possession of the Comptrollers office. This 
coup W etat threw Hall, Tweed and Sweeny on their beam- 
ends. It acted like a bombshell in political circles. Mayor 
Hall, utterly demoralized, forthwith sent to Connolly an 
official notification that he regarded his delegation of au- 
thority to Andrew H. Green as " equivalent to a resigna- 
tion, and," he ^dded, " I hereby accept your resignation," 



Mayor hall ox the hami'A(;k. 365 

Then, as if lie cauii;lit a new idea, lie says, in the same 
comniiinication, that he thinks he has power to remove him 
alisolutelj; and, '^ therefore, to save all question, I her;' 
remove you from the head of the Finance De])artment." 
When this letter arrived at the Comptroller's office, there 
were present : Andrew 11. Green, Richard B. Connolly, 
Charles O'Conor, Samuel J. Tilden, Wheeler II. Peckham, 
AVilliara F. Havemeyer, William A. Beach, Judge George 
C. Barrett and Samuel G. Courtney, and when Mayor Hall's 
official communication was read, it was greeted with loud, 
long, and hearty laughter, which was heard distinctly in 
the outside offices by the clerks and other officials, who, 
without knowing why, laughed heartily themselves, possi- 
bly intending it as a sort of paean to the new power. Those 
inside were laughing at Hall, and those outside were laugh- 
ing at him, too, but they didn't know it. Then, after a 
few minutes, came another document from the Mayor, sent 
to all Departments, as follows : 

Mayor's Office, City Hall, 

New York, September 18, 1871. 
" Sir : 

I am directed by the Mayor to inform you tliat lie does not recognize 
either Richard B. Connolly as Comptroller, or Andrew H. Green as 
Deputy Comptroller or Acting Comptroller. 

Very respectfully, 

Charles O. Joline, 

Chief Clerk." 

When this was handed in to the Comptroller and read, 
there was another loud burst of merriment. The great 
lawyers and politicians were laughing at Hall again. 

Then Mayor Hall, with the rapidity which characterized 
all his movements, a])pointed General George B. McClel- 
lan Comptroller, and published it to the world. Then, 
for a time, the matter began to look serious. Would 
the Mayor, throtigh the police, force an entrance, with 
McClellan at the headi Everything was topsy-turvy. 



S66 THIRTY YEARS OF' NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Messengers were running hither and thither. The Mayor 
was working at his desk with desperation. Great crowds 
were assembled at the foot of the stairs leading- to the 
Comptroller's office, and more were every moment arriv- 
ing. They were principally members of the St. Patrick's 
Mutual Alliance, Connolly's pet organization. The situa- 
tion was known in Wall street, and stocks were affected. 
The Ring, or rather now the Triumvirate, of Tweed, 
Sweeny and Plall, were again welded together for mutual 
protection, believing that Connolly, now in the hands of 
the Philistines, would, unless prompt action were taken, 
turn over all incriminating documents to the authorities. 
It was a desperate moment and their only safety was a 
forcible entry, or an injunction against Connolly and Green 
from some Ring Judge. This latter course was decided 
upon; but while the papers were being prepared, informa- 
tion of their intention reached the Committee, in the Comp- 
troller's office ; for, it appears, both sides had their spies. 
It was not long before word was brought to the Ring 
Judges that, if anything of that kind were attempted, a 
public disclosure would be made of certain doings which 
would inflame the public. This so terrified the Judges 
that they refused to interfere, fearing a popular uprising. 
In the midst of the excitement, the Presidents of ten dif- 
ferent Banks called upon Acting Comptroller Green, and 
offered to back him up in every respect. Besides, a num- 
ber of prominent merchants and other business and profes- 
sional men called, and said that if any illegal interference was 
attempted with Green, as the custodian of the public funds, 
a Vigilance Committee of the most respectable citi- 
zens would be immediately formed. A large force of 
armed men was selected to garrison the Comptroller's office 
and guard the books and papers during the night, and for 
a time excitement was at the highest pitch. 

Then Charles O'Conor's law opinion, which was semi- 



CAPTIKE OF THE KING CITADEL 



367 



otlicially asked f<n- in writiii^i,^ by Samuel J. Tildcn, as 
Chainnan of the Democratic State Central Committee, was 
published, iti whieh he conclusively showed that Mr. 
Cireeu's appointment was absolutely legal, and that neither 
the Mayor, nor any appointee of his, had any authority in 
law t(. interfere with him in the discharfre of his public 
duty. 

This seemed to settle the controversy— for George B. 
McClellan not only refused to be a party to enter the 
office by force, but he now even declined to be sworn in. 

Various rumors were afloat, one of them being that 
Mayor Hall had gone stark mad, and had to be held down 
by four strong men, who took him home in a carriage. 

The City was in arrears to many employees for several 
months, notwithstanding the $30,000,000 raised for the 
running of the City government, and these now began to 
hope for speedy payment, so that the taxpayer and the tax- 
eater joined hands, for once, but from different motives, 
in welcoming into power the same administration. 



LETTER XXXII 

Comptroller Connolly's Millionaire Whitewashers — 
The Orange Riot, its Cause and Serious Result — "The 
Wonderful House that Tweed Built" — When Tammany 
Hall Was Closed Tight on an Election Night — Frag- 
ments OF THE "Unterrified'' Trying To Brace Each 
Other Up— Dying Throes of a Remnant of the Tweed 
Regijie — Aldermanic Attempt to Impeach the Mayor 
— How the Would be "Hold-Overs" Were Out- 
generalled by Judge Abraham R. Lawrence — Evolu- 
tion of a New Tammany Boss. 

My dear Dean : — 

I believe it is when Saturn is in the ascendant, that astrol- 
ogists predict the occurrence of all sorts of dire calamities ; 
and, if this be true, it would seem that that baneful planet 
must have "had one eye" at least on New York City 
Hall and the New Court House at the beginning of July, 
1871, giving special attention to what was known as the 
Tweed Ring. " Whom the gods wish to destroy they 
first make mad," had its verification at about this same 
period ; for it was the suspicious and reckless character 
of the legislation of that year, which first seriously 
aroused public attention to the rascally transactions of the 
" inner circle," so supreme in power at the beginning of the 
year; and which induced ComjDtroller Connolly, in res- 
ponse to the attacks of the press, shortly after the adjourn- 
ment of the Legislature, to invite a committee of three 
millionaires, Messrs. John Jacob Astor, Moses Taylor and 
Marshal O. Roberts, to come to his rescue and " save the 
credit of the City " by examining his accounts, and thus re- 
fute the slanders that had been circulated. These gentle- 
men accepted in good faith the books of accounts shown 

368 



WHAT LEI) TO TlIF- ORANGE RIOT. 86d 

them by Comptroller C\)iiii()lly, and o;ave liim as (2;oo(l a 
coat of wllite^vasll as a ])ractieal joker, some thirty years 
previously, had hired a darky to give the City Hall— wlien 
the darky artist and a colored associate put a coat of lime 
over all the brown-stone base on one side of the building 
before they were arrested. In view of the fact that 
a few months thereafter the books of the Comptroller's 
ottice disclosed the startling figures, tliat millions of 
dollars had been stolen from the City Treasury, the de- 
ception practised on these able and prominent citizens by 
"Slippery Dick" was the subject of miiversal comment, 
and, had it not been so serious a matter, would have 
provoked universal laughter. 

But INIr. Connolly was an expert bookkeeper. 
Mayor A. Oakey Hall, (who in earlier days had been a so- 
called "• Know-Xothing," or an active member of the Native 
American party ; afterwards a semi- Republican ; then an 
Apollo Hall or anti- Tammany Democrat, with Mr. Wm. C. 
Whitney ; and who finally found himself, through Mr. 
Tilden's influence, a District Attorney, elected by the votes 
of Tammany Hall,) had on the seventeenth day of March, 
1870, evoluted into an " apostle " of the Irish Societies, 
and reviewed their parade from the City Hall, dressed 
(as I have before stated) in an elegant suit of green, 
with a sprig of shamrock for a boutonniere ; which 
])erformance he repeated, with some modifications, on 
the ITth of March, 1871. Two or three lodges of 
•' Orangemen " had received permission from the Police 
Commissioners, as usual, to parade on the 12th of 
July of that year. There had been numerous threats 
of disturbance, and Archbishop McClosky, and in fact 
all the Catholic clergy had used every possible effort 
to prevent any interference with the proposed Orange de- 
monstration, should the parade take place. Perhaps, 
with the best of intentions to preserve the peace, mingled 



370 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

with the natural desire of a politician to invoke toward tlie 
then tottering Ring the more steadfast sympathy of the 
Irish portion of the community, Mayor Hall had, after a 
prolonged consultation with Police Commissioner Henry 
Smith and General Alexander Shaler, commander of the 
First Division, N. Y. S. National Guard, induced Superin- 
tendent of Police Kelso to issue General Order No. 57 to 
the several police captains in the city, in which after a 
lengthy discussion of the inadvisability of such a demon- 
stration as contemplated by the Orangemen, "in perpetua- 
tion of foreign feuds," he concluded as follows : 

" You are ordered to prevent the formation or progression of the 
public street procession, on the 13th instant, and of all processions 
under pretense of target practice. You will also on that day im- 
partially keep all the streets cleared from groups and assemblages of 
every class of citizens, whether sympathizing with or against the pro- 
posed procession, or whether they are lawlessly disposed or otherwise." 

Great was the public indignation at this action on the 
part of the Mayor and Police Commissioners, not because 
of popular sympathy with any demonstration calculated to 
inflame animosities begotten of differences in religious 
creeds, but because it was regarded as a surrender of the 
right of assemblage at the dictation of a religious and 
political society. On the one hand, it was contended that no 
Orangeman is eligible to American citizenship while re- 
taining membership in the Orange Society ; and that con- 
sequently the Orange parade, accompanied with banners and 
music deeply offensive to a large portion of the City's pop- 
ulation, was a direct challenge to a breach of the peace. On 
the other hand, it was firmly held that, no matter how dis- 
tasteful might be the display, it must not be prevented by 
intimidation or other mob methods. Adopting the latter 
view, Governor Hoffman immediately countermanded the 
edict of Police Superintendent Kelso, stating, in his proclam- 
ation, dated New York, July 11th, 1871 : 



HALL'S FATAL fNTERMEDDLlN(!, 3)1 

" I hereby give notice that any and all bodies of men desiring to as- 
semble and march in peaceable procession in this city, to-morrow, 
l'2ih of July, will be permitted to do so. They will be protected to 
the fullest extent possible by the military ami police authorities." 

Acting ill acoordaiice Avith Supi-'riiitendent Kelso's mani- 
festo, most of the Orangemen liad arranged to celebrate the 
day in New Jersey ; but 160 men of Gideon Lodge, taking 
advantage of the permission given by the Governor, paraded 
ill this city. They were escorted by numerous policemen 
and by four regiments of militia — the Seventh, Ninth, 
Twenty- second and Eighty-fourth. The streets were lined 
with spectators. When the procession reached Eighth 
avenue, between Twenty -fourth and Twenty-fifth streets, a 
shot fired from a tenement house was the signal for a gen- 
eral onslaught by a mob gathered there, composed of 
" Kibbonmen," scattered among whom, as is always the 
case on occasions of turbulence, w^ere many of the dan- 
gerous classes of the community. In the melee, pavements 
were torn up and chimneys pulled down for material for 
assault, and bricks and stones were rained upon the pro- 
cession. But there were no signs of retaliation until 
private Page, of the Ninth Regiment, was shot, the top of 
liis skull being blown off, when orders to fire were given and 
a volley of bullets flew in the direction of his assailant. 
The contest then was sharp and decisive ; the mob was 
dispersed, and the procession soon afterwards disbanded. 
In this conflict, two soldiers and one policeman were killed, 
and twenty-six policemen and soldiers were wounded. Of 
the rioters, forty-four men, besides a woman and a boy, 
were killed, and sixty-one wounded. Of course, the ex- 
citement throughout the city was intense, and Mayor Hall 
was severely condemned by all classes, it being generally 
believed that his over-ofiiciousness led to the serious results ; 
whereas without his intermeddling, all this might have 
been avoided, and only the usual disturbance incident to 



Sr2 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

such demonstrations, up to that time successfully managed 
by the police, would have followed. 

The Orange riot and its serious consequences, in connec- 
tion with the sensational figures of alleged robberies by the 
Ring and its thieving adherents, led to the culmination 
of popular ire which I have described in previous 
letters. I have avoided tiring you with tabulated state- 
ments of the rapacities of the Ring ; but I may mention 
here, en passant, that, during the years 1869, '70 and '71, 
according to the Ring's acknowledgment, no less a sum than 
$8,223,579.89 had been expended on the New Court House, 
fronting on Cliambers street, while the authorized appro- 
priation by the Legislature amounted only to $1,400,000 ! 
In the neighboring city of Brooklyn— now a part of 
Greater New York — there was built, between the Fall of 
1861 and 1865 (the period of the Civil war, when work and 
materials were at their highest,) a Court House almost as 
large as the New York building. The structure in Brook- 
lyn was of marble, brick and iron, and the internal furnish- 
ing was in most respects equal and in many respects 
superior to that of the New York Court House. The 
original cost of the building in Brooklyn was $551,758.28, 
and the cost up to 1871 was $715,601.54:. Up to the same 
date the cost of the then nnfinished New York Court 
House was sufficient to build not less than sixteen such Court 
Hotises as that of Brooklyn ! The monstrous outrage on the 
taxpayers of New York City induced a wag to issue a pictor- 
ial satire on the New York Court House, in 1871, calling it 
" The House that Tweed Built," of which the following is 
a sample stanza : 

"This, sir, is Sweeny, Peter B., 
In the plastering deepest of all the three — 
Sweeny, 

Garvey, and 

Connolly, 
(Otherwise known as ' ' Slippery Dick ") — 



COSTLY HOUSES OF RING FAVORITES. 373 

Who controlled Ihc plastering laid on so thick, 
From roof to cellar, on wood and brick. 
In the wonderful House that Tweed built." 

P>iit l\veed wa.s not the only one who hiiilt costly houses, 
liiehard B. Connolly, then ConiptroHer, built himself a 
inai^niticent mansion on Fifth avenue, corner of One Hun- 
dred and Thirtieth street, now owned and occupied by 
Jordan L. Mott, son of the founder of the village 
of Mott Haven, north of Harlem Iliver ; Henry W. 
Genet, who, as State Senator, so bitterly fought against the 
Ring, in the cause of the Yoaug Democracy contest of 
1870, but who had been '"• pacified " by receiving the 
privilege of superintending the construction of a District 
Court House in Harlem, managed, according to charges 
made, to get almost enotigh material out of the job to help 
him construct for himself a capacious brown-stone house on 
Fifth avenue and One Hundred and Twenty-sixth street, 
with a large brown-stone stable adjoining on the side street. 
Regard for the impartial truth of history requires me to add 
that this latter statement was flatly denied by Genet, 
nor were the charges substantiated at his trial. But 
the Senator did not enjoy the pleasure of occupying his 
palace. He was arrested, tinder the pressure of the Com- 
mittee of Seventy, convicted, and while in charge of a 
deputy -Sheriff who escorted him to see and bid good-bye 
to his wife escaped. After having been for nearly three 
years a fugitive from justice, he delivered himself up and 
was then sentenced to a year's imprisonment and a fine of 
about slO,000,— which sum was made up by a subscription 
among his friends. But, as misfortune seemed to follow 
every move he made, he became sick and discouraged, and 
did not long survive his release. 

I need not say that such a condition of affairs as has been 
shown in my letters, was eagerly utilized for political effect 
by the Republican party, not only in this City, but through- 



374 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

out the State ; and the Democracy, made responsible for 
the rapacities of a few selfish leaders, was swamped at the 
ensuing election. In the Senate which sat in Albany, at 
the adjournment of tlie Legislature in 1871, were seventeen 
Democrats. Throughout the entire State, in the month 
of November of that year, there were elected only seven 
Democrats, of whom Tweed was one ; and, instead of the 
twenty Tammany men who had occupied seats in the 
Assembly Chamber, only six were elected in November of 
1871. Consequently, in place of the usual illumination and 
jollilication over the receipt of election returns, Tammany 
Hall was, on this election night, as dark as pitch. The 
crowd which had gathered outside, waiting for the doors to 
open, looked on and wondered. " Ain't this hall going to 
open to-night r' inquired an impatient outsider of the 
janitor of the building, who had been brought to an open 
window by tremendous and incessant pounding on the 
outer doors. "No, sir," replied the janitor; "the an- 
nouncement of returns will be made at Police Head- 
quarters, and the hall will not be opened to-night. Please, 
notify your friends outside." "• Well," exclaimed the ap- 
plicant for admission, ^ of course that means we have been 
beaten out of sight. If we have, it was by ploughing with 
a Democratic heifer [Tilden] that the Committee of 
Seventy have succeeded in betraying the Reform move- 
ment into the hands of the Republican Philistines." The 
comment of this " unterrilied " Democrat was correct. The 
locks of the Democratic Samson were shorn, while reposing 
in the arms of the Republican Delilah. 

On Friday, Dec. 20, Tweed was arrested in his office by 
Sheriff Matthew T. Brennan under an order of Judge 
Learned, of Albany, based upon an affidavit of Samuel 
J. Tilden in a civil action brought against Tweed by the 
State for the recovery of $6,000,000 which, it Avas alleged, 
he had stolen from the City. On the same day he sur- 



TAMMANY AFTKK THE AVALANCHE. 875 

rciuk'ivd his ofliee of Coiuniissionor of Public Works to the 
^[ayor, George M. Van Nort, then connected witli the 
Park Department, being a])pointed to fill the vacancy. On 
the same day, too, lie resigned as a Director of the Erit' 
Railway and also as Grand Sachem of the Tammany 
Society. 

A fragment of the now thoroughly demoralized Tam- 
many Hall General Committee assembled on the call of the 
Secretary, at the instance of several prominent members, on 
the evening of December 29. A chill seemed to pervade 
the meeting something like that which attends a funeral ; 
but, after a brief talk, some of the members present 
mustered courage enough to prepare, and present for con- 
sideration of the assemblage, the following preamble and 
resolutions : 

W/urecis : The fact that grave charges of fraud and corruption have 
been made against prominent leaders of the Democratic parly, through 
tlie public press, and the proceedings of the courts, familiar to all ; and, 

Whereas, the organization of Tammany Hall, of which these indi- 
viduals are members, feels deeply the opprobrium their conduct has 
brought to it, and while it regrets that they should have so far for- 
gotten the obligations resting upon them in the high positions to which 
they had been elevated through its power and influence, as to bring dis- 
grace upon themselves and the Democratic party, yet we cannot for a 
moment admit that the sins or crimes of a few persons connected with 
it should be allowed to work the destruction of the organization, or 
jiaralyze its usefulness for the future ; therefore, be it 

Resolved, That we deem it necessary to the interests of the Demo- 
cratic party of the State and country- that the organization known as 
the Tammany Hall General Committee should continue to be the regu- 
lar Democratic organization of the City and County of New York. 

Resolved, That we are in favor of a thorough reform in the admin- 
istration of our municipal and State governmeats, and also of a radical 
reform in the Federal government, to the end that the rights and bene- 
tits designed to be conferred by governmental organization may be 
enjoyed by all, while economy and integrity shall mark the administra- 
tion of each and every department of the same. 

Resolved, That while we in the strongest terms condemn those who 
have used the power of their offices to deplete the treasury of the City 
and County, and have thereby imposed increased burdens upon the 



376 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

people, we at the same time commend the exertion of all men who, with 
a desire to benefit their fellow citizens, have devoted their time and 
energy in exposing and stopping the sluiceways of fraud and extrav- 
agant expenditure. 

Resolved, That we hereby pledge ourselves to give all the aid in our 
power to perfect a thorough and radical reform in the administration 
of our City and County affairs. 

The reeoliitions were unanimouslj adopted and a call was 
issued for the election of a new General Committee for the 
ensuing year. 

There was quite a squabble at this meeting, which was 
participated in by Aldermen Plunkett and Woltman, ex- 
Judges Connolly and Dodge, Judges Dowling and Shand- 
ley, Park Commissioner Fields, Assemblyman Dennis 
Burns, Martin J. Keyes, and other prominent men in the 
party, over the appointment of inspectors of election 
— always such an important factor in Tammany Hall — but 
it was soon adjusted, and it bore evidence of the fact that 
the old machine " was not dead yet." 

This meeting of the Tammany Committee was followed, 
the next day, by a special meeting of the Sachems of the 
Tammany Society; and, on motion, Augustus Schell, a 
prominent and wealthy lawyer, was elected Grand Sachem, 
vice William M. Tweed, resigned. 

A great solar eclipse had been predicted for December, 
1871. There could not have been a greater political eclipse 
than that which was now experienced by Tweed. Less than 
six months previously his power in New York City was 
supreme. Now he had divested himself of every muni- 
cipal position — not yet, however, of every "pull" — but 
retained the office of State Senator. 

It may be a matter of surprise why, having surrendered 
his municipal office and his directorship of the Erie Eail- 
way, he had not also surrendered the office of State Senator. 
Had his purpose been to prove his willingness to abandon 
all further political aspirations, he most certainly would 



WRIGGLIN(;S OF A KING REMNANT. Z7i 

have sent in his resignation as State Senator, But Tweed 
had not yet given up liope of recovering his lost prestige 
and power. With an affected submission to public senti- 
ment, he adroitly resigned the office of Commissioner of 
Public Works, as the one most conspicuous before the pub- 
lic gaze, in order to appease public clamor, and lull public 
apprehension ; but he retained the ])owerful office of State 
Senator so as keep himself in a position of advantage after 
the storm should have blown ovei*. 

New Year's Day, 1872, presented to the citizens of New 
York City another sensation, and one of such peculiar 
character that I think it is well worth recording. 

The charter of 1870 contained a provision that the term 
of the Boards of Aldermen and Assistant Aldermen then 
in office should be extended to the first of January, 1872, 
and that they should then be appointed by the Mayor to 
hold office until the following June. Thus instead of 
submitting to the usual election in the Fall, they were by 
this legislation to be continued in office five months longer 
than their elected term. There being some doubt as to 
the constitutionality of this provision of the charter, the 
Reform Party of 1871 determined to and did elect, in the 
Fall of that year, a new Board of Aldermen and Assistant 
Aldermen, and, if need be. test the constitutionality of this 
provision, as the only way to get rid of the existing rem- 
nant of the Ring. The new Board of Aldermen, by advice 
of counsel, resolved to take possession of the City Hall at 
noon on January 1st, 1872, and the old Boards had deter- 
mined to prevent it. Judge John R. Brady, of the Supreme 
Court, had issued writs prohibiting the old Common Coun- 
cil from exercising the functions of their office after the day 
and hour named, and the members of the old Common 
Council ha,d decided to disregard the action of the Court, 
and hold fast to their positions until the following June, 
when, as they contended, their terms would expire. 



378 Thirty years of new york politics. 

The old Boards assembled at nine o'clock in the morning, 
the Aldermen in their chamber, and the Assistant Aldermen 
in theirs. The new Boards had established headquarters in the 
Governor's Room, City Hall. The writs of prohibition issued 
by Judge Brady had not yet been served on the old Alder- 
men, and the counsel to the new Board, Henry L. Clin- 
ton, and Abraham E.. Lawrence (now a Judge of the Su- 
preme Court) were reconnoitring in the hall, looking out for 
a stray City Father on whom to serve the fatal document, 
and in this work they were assisted by three or four clerks 
who acted as scouts to the besieging party. As may well be 
imagined, such a state of affairs had the effect of creating a 
good deal of excitement around the City Hall, and attracted 
quite a thrcmg of citizens. 

As soon as the old Board assembled, they proceeded to 
the dispatch of the special business they had on hand, which 
was the impeachment of the Mayor. Of course, they had 
to put on record some reason for so important a proceeding ; 
and a paper containing the following specifications was read 
for the edification of the members of the Board : 

The Special Committee appointed by this Board to examine the 
financial condition and accounts of the City and County, in conjunction 
with a like committee appointed by the Board of Supervisors, respect- 
fully report : 

That your Committee, desiring to make a thorough and exhaustive 
examination of all the City and County accounts, selected the following 
gentlemen, all of whom are citizens of well-known character and irre- 
proachable integrity, to act with them, in conducting their ex imination 
and investigation, namely: Messrs. Wm. A. Booth, Royal Phelps, Pauj 
N. SpofEord, Thos. W. Pearsall, Thos. A. Jeremiah, B. L. Solomon, 
Robert L. Cutting, Robert Lenox Kennedy, II. B. Claflin, James A. 
Roosevelt, Wm. H. Osborne, Samuel Willetts, John J. Donaldson, John 
E. Parsons, John N. Potter and James Brown. 

That the said Committee of citizens, after having carefully and in- 
dustriously prosecuted their investigation, during a period of nearly two 
months, submitted the result of their investigations with your Commit- 
tee, in the repoit hereto annexed. That said Committee report that 
gross frauds have been practised in the management of City and County 



AN ALDEUMANK LMPEACUMKNT FARCE. 379 

affairs, but do uot implicate any particular public oflicial, or recommend 
that any specific action be taken by the City and County authorities, 
other than that a copy of the report and document, therein referred to, 
be transmitted to His Honor the Mayor. 

Your Coniniittee, having carefully examined the report of tlie Com- 
mittee of citizens, upon which said report is based, having come to the 
conclusion that the report was fully justified and called for by the facts 
developed upon the investigation of the City and County affairs, did not 
deem it advisable to make their report to this Board until they had care- 
fully considered what action it would be proper for your Committee to 
recommend to this Board and the Common Council, under the startling 
revelations of fraud developed by the investigations instituted by this 
Board. 

Your Committee hoped that the various organizations, ostensibly 
formed for the purpose of exposing corruption and bringing those offic. 
ials guilty of fraud to punishment, would have consulted and advised 
with your Committee as to what course ought to be pursued by the City 
and County authorities, in order to punish those who have been guilty 
of fraud, and if possible to recover back the money fraudulently ob- 
tained from the City and County treasury ; but, although your Com- 
mittee were ready and willing and anxious to recommend such action 
as should best subserve the interests of the City, your Committee have 
never received from any quarter any intimation that the co-operation 
or assistance of the Common Council was desirable or requisite, or 
could be made beneficial to the interests of the City, or the cause of jus- 
tice or reform. Although your Committees have shown their earnest- 
ness and sincerity, in having called to their assistance a number of the 
ablest and best citizens of our City, and had thereby caused the whole 
machinery of fra'id in the City and County government to be thor- 
oughly exposed, in a manner that left no doubt whatever in the minds 
of the cit'.ZLns of this City that the investigation had been thoroughly 
and impartially conducted, your Committee are, however, of the opinion 
that the Common Council .should not be entirely silent or inactive under 
the circumstances, but that they should recommend that such action be 
taken as the law permits and the circumstances of the case require. 

After all this attempted cajolery, gotten up only as a pre- 
text and basis for their after action, the communication from 
the Special Committee goes on to discuss the provisions of 
the City Charter, the intention of which, they say, was to con- 
centrate all power in the hands of the Mayor, and to make 
him specially, if not exclusively, responsible for the good 



S80 tillRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

order and efficient government of the metropolis ; and, as 
he did not communicate to the Common Council any- 
thing relating to the discovered condition of affairs, " he 
should be held responsible, and be deemed liable for the 
frauds that have been committed." The report concludes 
with the following recommendation : 

"Your Committee, therefore, recommend that the Mayor be impeached 
for malfeasance in office, in not having properly discharged the duties 
imposed upon him by law." 

The Board then passed resolutions formally impeaching 
" his Honor " , and appointed the Counsel to the Corporation, 
with Charles O' Conor and John Hardy to prepare articles 
of impeachment, and prosecute the same before the proper 
tribunal. 

After this tragedy came the farce, which must have 
been rather amusing to all concerned. The President of 
the Board asked Alderman Cuddy to take the chair, but he 
not being quick enough on the trigger, Alderman Mitchell 
"filled the gap," and then the President (as Alderman 
Coman) tendered his resignation,which was accepted. Alder- 
man Henry Woltman was then made President of the Board; 
whereupon the resigned Alderman (Coman) being one of the 
members of the new Board elected in November, said : " I 
am prepared to take the oath of office as Alderman of the 
City and County of I^ew York," which oath was adminis- 
tered to him by President Woltman. Alderman Plunkitt 
(now a State Senator) was then called to the chair by 
President Woltman, who said : " I beg leave to tender my 
resignation as President of the Board of Aldermen." His 
resignation being of course accepted, Alderman (and ex- 
president) Woltman then said : "■ I nominate Alderman 
Thomas Coman as the President of the Board of Aldermen 
of 1872" ; which motion, being put and carried, the "re- 
volved " President thanked the Board for "■ the honor they 



BEARDING THE CITY FATHERS IN THEIR DEN. 381 

had conferred upon him, and promised to discliarge tlie 
duties of the office fairly." 

The interpretation of all this manoeuvring was that JSfr. 
Gonian, having been re-elected as Alderman and having re- 
signed from the old I5oard, was sworn in by the President 
of the old Board as a member of the new Board for 1872, 
and then, having been re-elected President of the Board, he 
(the Mayor having been impeached) would be the acting 
Mayor of the City. As such, under the provisions of the 
Charter of 1S70, he woukl appoint all the old Ahlermen and 
Assistant Aldermen, and thus "checkmate" the new 
Board. But, he " counted his chickens before they were 
hatched." 

At the hour of twelve o'clock, William H. Moloney, 
clerk of the old Board, began to read something which was 
necessary in organizing the Board for the year 1872, when 
a rather tall man popped up among the spectators, outside 
the railing wliich separated the City Fathers from the " ca- 
naille." This man was at once recognized as Abraham R. 
Lawrence, one of the counsel to the new Board, who had 
his pocket full of writs. As he began to speak, his voice 
was immediately drowmed in the hooting of the members, 
and the clerk rapped violently on the top of his desk with 
liis gavel. Mr. Lawrence was still for a moment, but as 
soon as the clerk ceased to rap, he began again. The clerk 
resorted to his gavel a second time, and the Aldermen 
again began to cast epithets at Mr. Lawrence, who pro- 
ceeded nevertheless in a firm, regular tone, which, said 
a reporter, "sounded like a magistrate reading the riot 
act to a seditious mob." The clerk continued to rap ; 
the lawyer, however, was equally persistent ; and the 
Aldermen were forced to hear his protest, in spite of 
their efforts to silence him. Mr. Lawrence, it was said, 
'' grew a little pale, for he did not know how soon an 
ink-stand might be hurled at his head." After repeating 



382 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the protest several times, and thus orally serving the writ 
of the Supreme Court on all the Aldermen at once, 
and assuring them that, if thej proceeded to organize 
themselves into a new Board, they would do so at their 
peril, Mr. Lawrence bade them "Good day," and walked 
out of the chamber. The Aldermen remained for some 
time, apparently undecided what to do ; and then, one 
after the other, took their departure. 

As soon as the room was cleared, the members of the 
new Board took possession and proceeded to organize, 
Alderman Yance being selected as temporary President. 
When this was done, Mayor Hall entered the chamber, and, 
addressing the chair, said : 

"Mr. President, if you will allow me a few words, I shall thank you 
for the favor. I came to the office of the Mayor of the City to- day, 
prepared, for the purpose of solving any legal doubt that might exist, 
to perform a pledge, I long ago entered into, of appointing the old 
Boards of Aldermen and Assistant Aldermen. I found that they had 
seen fit, on their part, to give me an opportunity to do as I pleased. 
They had taken^without any knowledge on my part, without seeking 
any conference — hostile action, both personal and official, against me. 
Whether or not this Board is in office by election, it certainly is in office 
by appointment of the Mayor, under the Charter of 1870 ; for, when the 
action of the Common Council was communicated to me, I saw I was 
at liberty to take hostile action on my part. There is thus a com- 
munion of title. If you are not elected, you certainly are appointed. 
These remarks are, of course, a little out of order, and I am indulging 
in them at the sufferance of the Board. And now, whether you are in 
office by election or by appointment, I shall proceed to administer, 
under the ordinance, the oath of office." 

The members of the new Board of Aldermen were 
then sworn in ; and prior to adjournment for the day, 
they rescinded, by a unanimous vote, the impeachment 
proceedings of the old Board. 

The members of the old Board tried to make themselves 
believe that their action on the first of January was all right, 
and that Alderman Coman was the only legal Mayor of 
the city ; but, like a nightmare, the delusion soon passed off. 



KvoLrriox of hoss.khin kkli.y. :is:^ 

In the lueautiiiie, primaries foi- the election of members 
of a new General Committee of Tammany 1 Tall were lielfl on 
.lanuarv G, 1872, bnt seemed not to have resnlted very satis- 
factorily. The first meetino^of the new Committee ended in 
a wraniile and a snarl ; and it was evident to everyone that 
the only way to put new life into the old institution was by 
an entire reorganization. And so, when the Tammany 
Society met on February 20 to install Augustus Schell as 
Grand Sachem, the condition of the Tammany Hall organ- 
ization was a subject of animated discussion ; and it was 
resolved that the subject be referred to a Committee of 
Twenty (to be appointed by the Grand Sachem), to whom 
all matters relating to the Society and to the Tammany Ilall 
General Committee should be referred. The gentlemen 
selected for this work were : Charles O'Conor, Oswald 
Ottendorfer, August Belmont, John Kelly, John J. Cisco. 
Andrew Mills, Manton Marble, Wm. B. Clark, John W. 
Chanler, Arthur Leary, George Law, James English, S. L. 
M. Barlow, George A. Jeremiah, S. F. Barger, Edwd. L. 
Donnelly, Thos. B. Tappen, Townsend Harris, Elijah AVard, 
Abram S. Hewitt, and Miles B. Andrews. These gentlemen 
arranged a conference with an equal number of members 
of the newly elected Tammany Hall General Committee, 
which resulted in an enrollment of Democrats in the en- 
tire City under the direction of a Committee of Seven, 
of which John Kelly was chairman. Nearly nineteen 
thousand voters were enrolled. Upon the basis of this 
representation a new General Committee for so-called " Re- 
generated Tammany " was elected. Congressman John AV. 
Chanler was chosen the iirst chairman of that Committee, 
and then from each Ward was appointed a member of the 
Committee on Organization, to whom all matters pertain- 
ing to the good and welfare of the party were referred. Of 
this latter Committee, John Kelly was soon afterward made 
chairman ; and thence evoluted a new " Boss," John Kelly, 



38i THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

who brought to the position all the experience of twenty 
years in politics, during which time he had served two years 
as Alderman, four years in Congress, and six years as Sheriff 
of the County of New York, and who, having been chairman 
of the Committee of Superintendence over the construe 
tion of the new Tammany Hall, in 1868, was now to under- 
take the more onerous task of rebuilding the organization 
which had its home there. Of his success in this direction 
I shall have something to say in subsequent letters. 

In conclusion, I may add that there was, at this period, 
in the metropolis, an organization of very active young 
men, known as the " Keform Democracy," which met in 
Apollo Hall, and which had exhibited great strength at the 
preceding November election, and numbered among its 
leaders Abraham E. Lawrence, Wm. H. Wickham (Chair- 
man), Henry L. Clinton, ex-Sheriff O'Brien, Wm. C. Whit- 
ney, Wm. C. Barrett, Samuel G. Courtney, Solomon 
Mehrbach, Joseph Shannon, Jenkins Van Schaick, Martin 
Nachtman, Peter Gilsey, Marcus Ottenburg, Christian 
Schwartzwelder, Alexander Spaulding and others ; and, had 
not Tammany started out on its " Kegeneration " trip at the 
time it did, there was an even chance that it might have 
been supplanted, so far as State recognition was concerned, 
by its young and powerful rival. 



LETTEK XXXIII. 

When Judge George G. Barnard was Triumphantly "Vindi- 
cated," According to Order— His Eccentricity and 
Reckless Humor on the Bench— A Picturesque Judicial 
Brigand— The Bar Association Pursues Him— Close 
Vote of the Assembly Committee on the Charges 
Presented— Finding of the Court of Impeachment- 
Stripped of Judicial Honors and Forever Disqualified 
from Holding Office— Fateful End of Judge John H. 
McCunn— An Unscrupulous Money-Getter Who Fell a 
Victim to Prosperity. 

My dear Dean : 

Next to that of Tweed himself, the fate of Judge 
George G. Barnard furnishes the most striking example 
of great wrong-doing in high public station followed by 
great degradation and punishment, of whicii tlie City of 
Kew York has a record. 

Like Tweed, Barnard was endowed with natural talents 
for public life which brought him popularity and position 
at an earlier age than is usual. Each in his own sphere of 
infamy was a master. The one was a reckless promoter 
of public plunder ; the other a reckless promoter of judicial 
profligacy. The one used his talents principally in cor- 
rupting the sources of Legislation; the other employed 
his intellect in corrupting the fountains of Justice. The 
one owned the City of New York as a man might own his 
farm ; the other dealt out judicial decisions as one might 
diial out merchandise. The one was sitting on a political 
throne, defiant, arrogant, and scornful of threats ; the other 
was sitting upon the judicial Bench dispensing injustice 

385 



386 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

with great liumor, and despoiling citizens of their rights 
and property, as though it were a pastime. 

Tweed was reached and torn down from his high station 
by the talons of the law, and made a felon and a pauper ; 
Barnard was not only shorn of his judicial powers by a 
high Court of Impeachment, but was disfranchised forever 
from holding any office of honor, trust or emolument in 
the State. 

Tweed died in prison, ending his days in the bitterest 
sorrow and humiliation ; Barnard, after the blow had fallen 
upon him, wandered about as a waif, his spirits broken, his 
health shattered, shunning his acquaintances, inconsolable, 
irritable and morose, until his death. 

All along through the years since then, as it is to-day, 
and as it will be for all time, Tweed stands out in history 
as the synonym of public plunder ; through the same inexor- 
able history, Barnard holds a permanent place in the annals 
of the Bench as the greatest judicial bandit of his age, or 
perhaps of any age. 

The physical and mental punishment of these public 
malefactors, great as it was, could not compare with the 
anguish of soul they must have felt had they realized that 
their acts and conduct would hand down their names to 
future generations, personifying the highest types of 
official rascality, and standing out, in almost solitary pre- 
eminence, an example and a warning for all time. 

Barnard was a man of strange humors and peculiarities. 
His appearance indicated that he was bubbling over 
with a spirit of fun. But still he was not by any 
means. promiscuous in his companionship, and confined his 
associations to a select few. There is not the slightest 
doubt that his personal qualities made him beloved by his 
associates. Perhaps this had not a little to do in spoiling him. 
He kept late hours, ate midnight suppers, drank champagne 
and went home merry. He was merry in the morning, as 



CATERING TO A WOULD-HE WITTY JUDCE. 387 

1k' took his scat upon the lu'iicli. In this respect at least, 
lie would be a ^^reat relief coin|)are(l with some ^n-outy, 
gruutiuii: Judf^es of the present day, and maybe it is 
a ])ity lie did not last longer. AVhether it was an early 
peculiarity of his or whether it was a device to steady 
liis nerves, which might have become more or less shat- 
tered by his life of excitement, it is impossible to say, but 
each morning his special officer, in attendance at Court, 
never failed to have a stick of wood and a sharp penknife 
on the Bench as he took his seat. All day long while 
listening to arguments of counsel, or while trying a case, or 
sitting in General Term, would Judge Barnard whittle this 
stick of wood, with his hands sufficiently lowered to conceal 
the operation from those in front of him. When the Court 
adjourned, a heap of shavings denoted the unabated vigor 
of the Judge. 

Although he strove to gain that reputation, it would not 
he correct to say that Judge Barnard was a wit. Perhaps, 
had lie not been a Judge, and uttered his pleasantries, or 
unpleasantries, elsewhere than on the Bench, the risible 
muscles of his hearers might not have been so readily 
affected. It was at the opening of a term of Court, when 
a great number of the legal fraternity were present, that 
Judge Barnard's fun was at its highest, if not at its best. 
If the outbursts of laughter from the assembled lawyers, 
which greeted his sallies, could be trusted, then Judge Bar- 
nard was justified in regarding himself as a genuine wit. 
No feigned or liy])Ocritical merriment of school boys, at the 
feeblest wit of their schoolmaster, could compare with the 
loud, and I must add, indecorous laughter, which lawyers 
indulged in, whenever Judge Barnard delivered himself of 
a funny saying on the Bonoli. This was noticeably true of 
those favored lawyers wlio diligently attended Court, look- 
ing for references. The art of smiling oneself into refer- 
ences is not vet lost, but now it is not a smile in the first 



388 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

instance, as in former times, but a reflected smile, from 
the great politician who must iirst smile on the applicant, 
before the Judge will smile on him. 

Judge Barnard, at the time I speak of, was a person of 
striking appearance, tall, well proportioned and handsome. 
His hair was slightly tinged with gray, but his moustache 
was jet black, (perhaps artistically kept so), his eyes were 
peculiarly brilliant, his complexion light olive, his carriage 
graceful and soldier like, his dress bordered on foppishness 
and there was about him an entire absence of that sedate 
and solemn bearing which characterizes most members of 
the Bench, in and out of Court, and which is often such a 
trying ordeal for some of our younger Judges to imitate. 

After the Bar Association had inaugurated proceedings 
for his impeachment. Judge Barnard never concealed his 
hostility towards its members. He strove in some comical 
ways to show his contempt for them and their charges. One 
day, a sedate lawyer, who was not a member of the Bar 
Association, was making a statement concerning the finan- 
cial condition of some firm in an assignment case, when 
Barnard, evidently absorbed more in his own troubles, than 
in those of the firm in question, suddenly and without the 
slightest warrant said to the lawyer : '' Beg pardon ; don't 
wish to interrupt you ; but I desire to say that if there is 
any member of the Bar Association here, he can have an 
additional specification in the charges against me, for I am 
going to scratch my head," at the same time suiting the 
action to the word. This silliness evoked great merriment 
in Court, in which the lawyers, particularly those who had 
cases on the day calendar, most heartily joined. 

" May it please yonr Honor," said ex-United States Dis- 
trict Attorney Samuel G. Courtney to Judge Barnard one 
day, as he sat in Chambers, '"it is with no desire to incon- 
venience your Honor that I would respectfully ask you to 
pass upon the motion papers which were submitted afte;- 



SAMPLE JOKKS rilOM THE BEN'CII. 389 

argument two weeks ago, in the ease of Jolinson against 
Hawks.'" " What's it about?" iiKjuired Barnard. "An 
application for an injunction," replied Mr. Courtney. "Our 
interests are sulTerinijj by the acts of the defendant." '• You 
want the decision soon ^ " asked Barnard, with a smile and a 
iiierrv twinkle in liis eye, for he was an old friend of Mr. 
Conrtney's. " I shall be very thankful," said Mr. Courtney, 
with a i,M'acious bow. " Well, then, your motion is denied, 
with costs," said Barnard. ]\[r. Courtney was taken- aback a 
little ; he stammered and smiled, evidently thinking it was 
one of Barnard's jokes. So it was, but a bad one for Mr. 
Courtney; for when he stated to the Judge, after the laugh 
was over, that he hoped he would reconsider his decision. 
Judge Barnard promptly said : '' Other Judges may desire to 
reverse Judge Barnard ; but he never likes to reverse 
himself.' ' 

He was no less curt, on one occasion, when two oppos- 
ing lawyers wrangled over mere technicalities, until Judge 
Barnard grew weary. "I ask leave your Honor," said 
one lawyer, "to amend by inserting the words" &c., 
&c. " And I move your Honor," said the other lawyer, 
'• to amend by inserting the words," &c., &c. Judge Bar- 
nard looked at the clock, jumped to his feet and said : 
'• Gentlemen, you each have leave of the Court to insert, 
if you choose, the whole of Webster's Dictionary. But 
I am goino; to lunch. The Court takes a recess." And 
Judge Barnard quickly disappeared through a side-door, 
while the lawyers began to pick up their papers, amidst the 
laughter of all in the Court-room. 

Samuel Hirch was a well-known lawyer. He had 
numerous qualifications, but perhaps what brought him 
most notoriety was a voice like a foghorn, and his diffi- 
culty was that he could not attune it or reduce it in force 
or volume, so that it could never be measured out in pro- 
portion to the size of the room where he spoke. 



390 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

The Supreme Court Cliauibers where motions were 
heard was a comparatively small room. As soon as Mr. 
Hirch opened his argument one day his voice startled 
every one in Court aud Judge Barnard, who presided, 
almost jumped to his feet. A few days after this another 
motion came on in which Mr. Hircli was to be heard, when 
his clerk asked Judge Barnard to grant a short adjourn- 
ment as Mr. Hirch was detained. " Where is he ? " said 
Judge Barnard. " In "Wall street, your Honor," said the 
clerk. " Yery well," said Judge Barnard, " let him just 
go aliead with his argument where he is ; I can easily hear 
him." 

Judge Cardozo gave most of his valuable references to 
Gratz Nathan, who was his nephew. Barnard extended a 
great many favors to James H, Coleman. Two lawyers, 
one representing the plaintiff and the other the defendant 
in an action, agreed in writing to refer the case to Gratz 
Nathan, and handed ujd an order of reference to Judge 
Barnard, who, when he observed the name of Gratz 
Nathan as Referee, exclaimed : " Gratz Nathan ! No, 
gentlemen ; ' Jimmy ' Coleman is my Gratz." 

Judge Barnard was one of the youngest, and, in many 
respects, one of the most popular members of the New 
York Bench. His position on the Supreme Court he had 
held for eleven years, and during that time he had done an 
enormous amount of judicial work. With the junior mem- 
bers of the Bar, his free and familiar manners and his 
generous consideration for their inexperience when they 
came before him in court, had made him a special favorite, 
while his intuitive knowledge of law, his discriminating 
judgment, his quickness in the dispatch of business, and 
the facility with which he could seize the salient point in 
any case upon which he might be required to adjudicate, 
earned him the good opinion of men his seniors in years 
as well as in legal experience. But in his general character 



''VINDICATED," ACCORDING TO OUDKK. Ml 

and conduct, in his t^howiobt as well as his sliacHcst qual- 
ities, he was the essential outcome of the systeni of which 
Tweed was the head. 

It will he renicnibered that in my letter on the Erie con- 
test of 1868, Ispoke of the manner in \\hich Judges Barnard 
and Cardozo were used bj Tweed to further his plan, and 
how Judge Barnard so prostituted his position that a suit 
for conspiracy was instituted against him and Cornelius 
Yanderbilt. But T did not state the further movements of 
Barnard. In the Fall of 1868 (his term of office expiring 
on the 31st of December of that year) he sought and ob- 
tained a renomination for a seat on the Bench from Tweed. 
The Boss had determined to elect Hoffman Governor of 
the State, and was bending every effort in that .direction. 
Horatio Seymour was nominated for the Presidency. The 
pending suit for conspiracy against Barnard would have 
been too conspicuous a target in the canvass (for which the 
opposition had loaded their guns), and it was thought nec- 
essary by Tweed that he should have a clean bill of 
health. So, being a member of the Board of Directors of 
the Erie Railway Company, Tweed arranged for the fol- 
lowing publication — for appearance sake dating the pro- 
ceeding of the Board several months back: 

" I hereby certify that at a meeting of the directors of the Erie Rail- 
way Compauy, held on the 10th day of July, 1868, the foil owing action 
was taken : 

" Whe7-ens, a certain action is pending in the Supreme Court of the 
State of New York in favor of the Erie Railway Compauy and James S. 
"Whitney against George G. Barnard and others ; and, whereas the 
complaint in such action charges the said Barnard with corrupt and 
improper action and conduct in his official capacity as a Judge of said 
Court; and, whereas we have become convinced, after a most ample 
and complete investigation that there is no foundation whatever for 
such charges ; therefore 

" Resolved, That the said charges be and the same are hereby with- 
drawn as wholly groundless. 

"Resolved, That the said action, as agaiust the said George G. 



392 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Barnard, be abandoned, so far as this company is concerned, as a party- 
plaintiff, and that our attorneys be and they are hereby instructed to 
discontinue the same accordingly." 

• Horatio N. Otis, 

Secretary. 

This " vindication," one of the papers of the day be- 
lieved would " silence all slander ;" and the same paper con- 
tinued " as one of our most fearless, independent and effi- 
cient dispensers of justice, we dare say Judge Barnard is 
sufficiently well known to run ahead of his ticket." 

The prophesy was correct. Through Tweed's manipula- 
tion. Judge Barnard, having now appeared before the 
public in judicial garments as white as snow, was made a 
Justice of the Supreme Court by a majority of 62,000 
votes. Thus was the Judge " triumphantly vindicated " — 
according to order, with fourteen more years of official life 
and its handsome emoluments in prospective. 

Secure for fourteen years' additional power upon the 
Bench, Judge Barnard entered with fresh vigor into a 
career of judicial recklessness. 

A remarkable episode occurred in the Supreme Court on 
the occasion of Tweed's first arrest. He was arraigned be- 
fore Judge Gunning S. Bedford in the Court of General 
Sessions. Judge Bedford was asked to fix the bail. Charles 
O'Conor for the prosecution said " I am unfamiliar Avith 
the practice, but I should say he ought to be committed 
without bail." To everybody's surprise Bedford committed 
Tweed without bail. Bedford evidently saw the storm ap- 
proaching and wanted to be " too good." Tweed was 
being hustled towards the Tombs prison, when the officer 
having him in custody was serve^ with a "Writ of Habeas 
Corpus issued by Judge Barnard. Brought immediately 
before Judge Barnard, Tweed stood in the presence of one 
of his oldest political associates. There were loud and angry 
arguments on both sides. The District Attorney, Samuel B. 
Garvin, for the prosecution, was not only very emphatic but 




ilti'druwii iruiii Frank Li'sllc's Weekly. By peniussiou. i 

(tK()K(;K (i. IjAKNAHI). 



OX'ONOR'3 SIGNIFICANT REMARK. 393 

80 apparently belligerent a* to «ivo ri'^e'to the suggestion 
that " he doth protest too nuich/' O'Conor made a length- 
ened arguuKMit. Judge l>arnrtrJ t^ecnied very careless of 
it. When he got through Judge J>arnard in an offhand 
style said he saw no difference between the case before him 
and that of any other of a similar grade, and he said, 
abruptly, '^ I will fix bail at !i^L>0,000." 

O'Conor, with a sarcastic smile, looked Barnard through 
and through, then quietly arose, picked up some of his law 
papers which were lying on the table, looked at Barnard 
again, resumed his work of picking up the papers, folded 
them together slowly, after which he gave Barnard another 
steady, piercing, scornful look. As he was leaving, he 
turned to a small group standing near and said : " He has 
dug his own grave." 

Some friend of Judge Barnard informed him of O'Conor's 
siirnificaut remark and Barnard said : 

• ' Well, now, see here 1 What a contemptible cur I would be, if 
poor Bill Jones was brought before me, charged with a bailable offence, 
aiid because he was poor I refused him his obvious rights. And if it 
would be contemptible to discriminate against poor Bill Jones, because 
he was poor, why wouldn't it be equally cowardly to discriminate 

against rich Bill Tweed, because he is rich ? I don't care a d n for 

anian's money. Bill Tweed's legal rights are the same as Bill Jones's, 
and if there was a string of Charles O'Conors from here to hell, I 
wouldn't refuse either Bill of what, in my judgment, he is entitled to. 
These so-called reformers are as crazy as Canada bed-bugs, and they 
expect me to do things that they would be the fir.st to condemn at any 
other time. The records of my Court will last a great deal longer than 
this reform cry, I can tell them, and I don t propose to be put in a hole 
to oblige Charles O'Conor or any other man." 

But, in spite of all Barnard's joviality and daring, there 
came a time when the dashing and apparently fearless Judge 
was by force of circumstances compelled to have serious 
thought, and that was whenthe depredations of the King 
first began to arouse public attention, and the talk of the 
formation of a Vigilance Committee cropped out in the 



394 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

press. Then it was that Judge Barnard, with a view, per- 
haps, of self-preservation, granted the injunction, to which 
I have previously referred. But, notwithstanding Judge 
Barnard's endeavors to save himself from the approaching 
deluge, the seed sown by that fearless member of the Bar, 
James T. Brady, had taken root. Leading members of the 
profession had determined that the then existing disgraceful 
Judiciary should receive public condemnation, and steps 
were quickly but surely and persistently taken to secure the 
impeachment of the Judges who had been mere subservient 
tools of the Ring. 

Accordingly, at a conference, it was agreed that Charles 
O'Conor and Samuel J. Tilden, of this City, Wm. W. 
Niles of Westchester County, and several other trustworthy 
lawyers, including David B. Hill, should seek positions 
in the ensuing Assembly to aid in the work of judicial ]3uri- 
fication. Charles O'Conor declined the nomination because 
as he was appointed by the Attorney General to prosecute 
the civil actions against the Ring, he had to devote all 
his time to these duties. But Messrs. Tilden, JSTiles, Hill 
and others, at the opening of the Assembly of 18T2, found 
themselves members of that body. 

]^o event of the Tweed regime excited greater astonish- 
ment, and in some quarters greater alarm, than did the 
proceedings for Barnard's impeachment. Less than twelve 
months before, Barnard had been overwhelmed by the 
eulogies of the ITew York press, as " the fearless and 
upright Judge," who had rescued the city from the grasp 
of the Ring robbers. The injunction which he had granted 
was practically a death-blow to the Tweed regime. It 
eiiectually arrested the course of the conspirators, and dis- 
ordered their schemes, by shutting off the chief source 
of supplies ; and the idea of a prosecution, invested with 
all the pomp and penalties of an impeachment, against 
a man who had done such a public service, while, so to 



UNEXPECTKl) AND SWKKl'lNd INJUNCTION. :$«5 

speak, the echoes of j)o]nil:ir :i|i|»laiise lor the deed wii.s 
still ill the air, surprised more than Jud^e Barnard's friends. 
In this connection, I may add a somewhat peculiar report of 
the injunction proceeding, which appeared in one of the 
daily papers at that time : 

The Court room was crowdod. Judge Barnard sat on the Bench, 
whittlinii a piece of soft pine as was his custom. Hveryone else was 
worked up to a pitch of excitement. The Judge knew that his decision 
was not to be affected by the arguments ; for he had it on his desk be- 
fore the Court opened ; so, with a jolly jocoseness, he looked about the 
room and whittled, while the counsel talked. When all had finished, 
he rendered the memorable decision that blocked the game of the Ring, 
upset all existent potencies, made Andrew 11. Green, master of the 
situation, sent into exile the millionaires of the era, and opened the way 
to his own down-fall. It was a wise decision, and was received with 
gratitude by the few good men in the council of the " outs." As 
Barnard left the Bench, a friend said to him : " Well, you have done it 
this time." To which, quick as a flash, with utter indifference to who 
might have heard him, he replied : " Peter ought to be satisfied, he 
wrote (or made) it himself." It may be doubted if any other living 
Judge would have admitted, still less announced, that his decision in a 
matter of such gravity had been prepared by the man who was popu- 
larly regarded as the brains of the organization then on its defence. 
From the Court-room, Barnard went direct to Delmoiiico's, then at the 
corner of Broadway and Chambers street, and for hours was the centre 
of a curious and friendly set, with whom he discussed the situation, 
and the grounds on which the injunction order was based. 

The statement that Peter B. Sweeny had written Judge 
Barnard's decision was no doubt a sensational fiirure, drawn 
from the reporter's imagination. Judge Barnard had said 
and done a good many foolish things, but it is safe to 
presume he never made such a spectacle of himself as the 
reporter had represented him. Besides, it is not likely that 
Sweeny, with his great sagacity and foresight, would have 
advised a step which was to annihilate the most essential 
power of the Ring of which he himself was the guiding 
spirit, or that he would have been treacherous enough to 
bring destruction upon his associates with the hope of 



396 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

saving himself, especially when no serious crisis was yet 
at hand. 

Why Judge Barnard should have delivered such a stun- 
ning blow upon his political associates and the system with 
which he was so intimately identified, in granting the Foley 
injunction, seemed at the time unintelligible. Looking back 
at it now, however, from our present standpoint, we can un- 
derstand it without difficulty. Judge Barnard, with all his 
lightness of disposition, was not deficient in shrewdness, or 
in the instinct of self-preservation. In the half articulate 
mutterings of public sentiment, he read the signs of the times ! 
Every day, the voice of popular discontent was becoming 
more distinct, and the tone of the press more fierce and more 
denunciatory of Boss Tweed and his hirelings. One New 
York journal, commenting upon the corruption of the Bench, 
mentioned Judge Barnard by name, and spoke with sinister 
suggestiveness of lynching, that was not lynching, very 
much in the same way as the pamphleteer during Cromwell's 
usurpation, spoke of "killing" as "no murder," in certain 
connections, which plainly included the Lord Protector him- 
self. There had moreover, been some talk as I have stated 
about the formation of a Yigilance Committee in New York. 
But, on the other hand, by the injunction in question, Judge 
Barnard had broken the back of the conspiracy ; had ren- 
dered a most valuable service to the community, and, in 
view of his having done so, that steps should be taken to 
disgrace and punish him, was a matter of surprise and won- 
der to many. But the able men who stood at the front of 
the reform movement gave Barnard no credit for his in- 
junction, or if they did, they were not willing to accept it 
as a condonation of his other misdeeds. 

With a desire to vindicate the dignity of justice and put 
an end to the scandals connected with the Judiciary, the 
Assembly of this State, in the early part of 1872, as had 
been urged by O'Conor, Tilden and others, appointed 



CAUDOZO'S KSCWl'K FROM IMPEACHMENT. :'.'.>r 

a Committee to iiKiuire into tlie charges presented by the 
Bar Association against Judge Barnard, and also ihto tliose 
against Judges Cardozo, Ingrahani and McCunn, with a view 
to their impeachment. 

The Committee began its investigation on February lUi 
1872, in the Fifth Avenue Hotel, New York City. Among 
its members ]iresent, on this occasion, were David B. Ilill 
and Samuel J. Tilden, both afterwards Governors of the 
State. It was decided tliat the proceedings should, at the 
option of the Committee, be private ; that tlie accused 
Judges should be allowed to be present, during the sessions 
of the Committee on their respective cases, accompanied 
by not more than two counsel, and might make such sug- 
gestions and ask such questions as the Committee should 
permit. To the Bar Association three counsel were per- 
mitted. 

In anticipation of the action of the Bar Association, Car- 
dozo and Barnard had their counsel at the Hotel, ready to 
answer tlie call of the Committee. Rufus F. Andrews and 
K. L. Fancher represented Barnard ; Judge FuUerton and 
E. II. Owens, Cardozo. It was proposed to leave out Mc- 
Cunn, in order to use him as State's evidence against the 
others. 

The case of Judge Cardozo was first proceeded with, 
after which, on March 5, the investigation into the charges 
against Barnard began. The last meeting of the Committee 
was held on April 9th, but the report was not sent to the 
Legislature until early in May, and in its issue of May 5th, 
the New York Sun made the announcement that "two 
hours before this was done, Judge Cardozo filed his resig- 
nation with the Secretary of State, tlius escaping the pen- 
alty which probably awaited him on the impeachment." 

This move on the part of the wily Judge was not quite 
unexpected. He had shown signs of weakening, and ex- 
liibited much nervousness during the investigation, but had 



398 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

spoken no word of bis intention. An impression, however, 
to this effect found utterance in the hints of outsiders, whicli 
reached Barnard's ears. Kealizing the bearins^ which sucli 
action would have on bis own case, he promptly called upon 
Cardozo, and asked him if there was any foundation for the 
rumor. " You will ruin everything, if you resign " said he ; 
" for your resignation will not only be regarded as an evi- 
dence of guilt, but it will compromise us all, and destroy 
any chance we may have of a fair trial." 

Cardozo replied with more than judicial calmness, quietly 
denied the truth of the rumor, and completely took Barnard 
off his feet, by observing, in a tone of voice more sugges- 
tive of sympathy than reproach : " You, my dear Barnard, 
are the last who should accuse anyone with attempting 
to steal a march upon you, when you remember your own 
conduct in connection with the Foley injunction. Who 
stole the march in that case, when, without a word to your 
friends, you yielded to popular clamor, in the hope, 1 sup- 
pose, of warding off the very ruin which by that order you 
would actually seem to have invited ? Whatever trouble 
there is, or whatever ruin threatens, you are the cause. 
However, I have not made up my mind to resign. As I 
feel now, I shall fight it out." 

Barnard could make no reply. Pie felt too keenly the force 
of Cardozo' s reproaches. The Foley injunction opened 
the way for all the disasters which had since befallen the 
Ring, and he alone was to blame. Reassured, however, 
by Cardozo's parting Avords, he hastened to share such 
comfort as they gave him with his friends. IText day, 
Cardozo sent in his resignation. He had deceived Bar- 
nard, had deceived the Boss, had tried to deceive every- 
body, by keeping his purpose secret, that he might be 
able to carry it out quietly, without being troubled, or 
running the risk of being diverted from it by the im- 



CUAKGES AGAINST JLIHiK HARNAKD. 399 

portiiuities and reproaches of lils colleagues on and oii 
the Bench. 

Barnard liad now, it might be said, to face the storm 
alone. McCunn's case would be, he had reason to believe, 
as it was ultimately, referred to the Senate, and the charges 
against Judge Ingrahaui, he being an old man and his 
term of oflice nearly expired, would most likely be allowed 
to drop. As Tweed was afterwards made to 'suffer for 
the sins of his confederates as well as his own, so Bar- 
nard, in addition to his own burden, had to bear a large 
part of the penalties due to the iniquities of others. 

It was understood that the ('ommittee of the Assembly, 
which remained in executive session one whole day, stood for 
many hours 4 for impeachment and 5 for removal, but that 
iinally, through the vote of William AV. Niles, of Westchester, 
a majority was obtained for impeachment ; and on May 
10th, Articles of Impeachment were presented against Judge 
Barnard by the Assembly to the Senate. On the 14th, the 
Senate met in joint session, with Chief Justice Church, 
Judges Folger, Allen and Peckham, of the Court of Ap- 
peals. " as a Coiu't of Impeachment for the trial of George 
G. Barnard, Justice of the Supreme Court, on a charge of 
raal and corrupt practices as such Judge." The names of 
Senators having been called, the Sergeant at-Arms, acting 
as crier, opened the Court, and the reading of the Articles 
of Impeachment being disposed of, a motion was passed 
requiring the accused to appear. The articles were thirty- 
five in numljcr, with many specifications, in which no 
peculiarity of the defendant's character or conduct, how- 
ever trivial, had been overlooked. 

On May 22d, the Impeachment Managers held a pre- 
liminary meeting for the selection of counsel and to fix the 
time and place of trial. Saratoga was selected as the place, 
and July ITth as the dare. ]\Iessrs. George F. Comstock 
and Joshua M. Van Cott were chosen as counsel to the 



400 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Board of Managers. The members of the Bar Association 
were invited to take part in the proceedings and to aid the 
managers by their advice and otherwise. At this meeting 
Jndge Barnard was present with his comisel, Wm. A. 
Beach, Judge Reynolds, Rufus F. Andrews and William O. 
Bartlett. When called upon, he replied, through his lead- 
ing counsel, Mr. Beach, who, on his behalf, submitted a 
general pTea of " not guilty," and a denial in detail of the 
charges made against his client. 

On Friday, July 19th, the Court met and opened the 
proceedings in the town Jiall of Saratoga. The Judges 
above named, aided by a number of Senators, took their 
seats as triers. When the Court had opened. Judge Bar- 
nard appeared with his array of counsel, headed by Mr. 
Beach, and took his seat at the place assigned him. 

Taking into consideration the unusual nature of the pro- 
ceedings, the gravity of the question involved, the emi- 
nence of triers and advocates, and the effect of the issue 
upon the character, reputation and future conduct of the 
Judiciary of New York, no Court of higher importance had 
ever sat, in this State, or one which was invested with 
deeper, I ought to say, with more solemn interest. 

On the opening of the Court, Mr. Beach on behalf of 
the respondent, said : " The articles of impeachment ought 
to be disregarded, on the ground that they had not been 
adopted by a majority of the members of the Senate elected 
thereto, and that, therefore, the respondent was not im- 
peached in due form of law." He also contended that no 
cognizance should be taken of certain of the Articles, inas- 
much as they referred to matters which had occurred before 
Judge Barnard had entered on his present term of office ; 
that, if they did occur, the people were presumed to have 
known of them ; and, notwithstanding this, elected him, 
and the election operated as a condonation of any alleged 
prior offences. To press these articles, then, would be to 



"JOSIE" MANSFIELD TESTIFIES. 401 

override the autliority and will of the peojjle. These oh- 
jections, as well as an objection to other Articles, on the 
j:;round of irrelevance and va<2;tieiiess, when put to the 
([uestion, were overruled by a vote of 23 to 9. 

In answer to Judge Van Cott, in a subsequent stage 
of the proceedings, who alleged that a Judge might be im- 
peached for mere acts of indecorum, and quoted certain 
English precedents to that effect, Judge Reynolds con- 
tended that, having been elected for a specified term, Judges 
could not be removed for mere acts of levity or indecorum, 
and bearing upon a similar question, Mr. I3artlett afterwards 
made the point, that under the spirit of the Constitution of 
this State, precedents from English authorities on Impeach- 
ment could not properly be considered by the Court. In 
sustaining this latter view, he quoted the opinion of Chief 
Justice Marshal, of the United States Supreme Court. 

Among the witnesses examined for the prosecution was 
the notorious " Josie " Mansfield, who figured so promi- 
nently in the trial of Stokes for the murder of James Fisk, Jr. 
Her evidence indicated a very large and miscellaneous 
array of admirers and acquaintances. At her house, I^o. 
35!) West Twenty third street, New York, Judge Barnard 
had been a frequent caller. There, too, the Directors of 
the Erie Railroad were in the habit of meeting for consulta- 
tion. Fisk, Gould, Tweed, Morgan and Dudley Field, 
were also mentioned as visitors — in fact, said she, with 
an air of nonchalance, " I have been in the habit of receiv- 
ing Judges, lawyers, members of the Bar Association and 
many other distinguished people— indeed, I think, Mr. 
Beach," turning her full face upon that gentleman, who 
was cross-examining her at the time, " I have received even 
you." '"But only in the way of business," hurriedly re- 
plied Mr. Beach, blushing in most unprofessional manner. 
" Oh, assuredly," said the smiling lady ; " only in the way 
of business." 



402 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

In its issue of August 2d, 1872, the New York 8u7i 
describes the i)roceedings in the following words : 

"The whole case for the prosecution is now in. It presents to the 
public thirty-five or thirty-six oflicial errors by Judge Barnard, during 
a period of eleven years' judicial service, in eight of which he has 
granted from 25,000 to 30,000 orders, including cases on the motion 
calendar and ex parte orders." 

On August 13th, before a sitting of the Court, in which 
were present all the Judges and eighteen Senators, the 
summing up began. Both sides were fully represented by 
counsel, Messrs. Yan Cott, Parsons, Pratt, Stickney and 
Burton N. Harrison appearing for the Managers, and 
Messrs. Beach, Andrews, Bartlett, Keynolds and Townsend 
for Judge Barnard. A crowded audience lent additional 
animation to the scene and fresh energy to the contending 
advocates, each of whom seemed confident of triumph. The 
argument for the prosecution was led off by Mr. Pratt, and 
followed by Mr. Stickney, who occupied the remainder 
of the day. On the 14th, Mr. Beach began his address 
for the defence. He reviewed Judge Barnard's career 
on the Bench, showed the work he had done, portrayed him 
at his post of duty at all hours of the day and night, in fol- 
lowing the course of what he described as "the peripatetic 
Courts of JS^ew York," exposed in terms of scathing denun- 
ciation the tactics of the Bar Association, as it crawled 
in the path of its victim from place to place, listening 
to his lightest word, and noting his minutest movement 
in its anxiety for materials out of which to construct the 
instrument intended for his ruin. The speech occupied 
seven hours. As the thrilling words of the peroration rang 
through the Hall, Judge Barnard's case seemed for the 
moment won. 

But Judge Yan Cott followed, and under his cool and 
crucial arguments the brilliant rhetoric of Mr. Beach fell to 
pieces. The picture was, as it were, reversed, and the 



THE "VERY WORST'- HAD HAPPENED. 403 

figure of the earnest and energetic Judge, as drawn hy the 
defence, grew, under the nianipnhxtion of Van Cott, into a 
caricature of judicial dignity and duty, as he dwelt upon 
the events of Judge Barnard's career. 

On the evening of August 17th, the Court remained 
in secret session for three liours and a half, and voted on 
the first nine Articles of the Impeachment. On the follow^- 
ing Monday the result of their deliberations appeared in the 
announcement that '' Judge Barnard had been acquitted, of 
the charge of pecuniary corruption." The hope of his 
friends rose exultingly. But they were hopes which a few 
hours would turn, like Dead Sea fruit, to ashes. The w^orst 
that Avould befall him, they imagined, "was deposition from 
the Bench, and that could be easily rectified at the next 
election. 

On the afternoon of the following day, Barnard was 
seated with some of his friends, in a room of the Grand 
Union Hotel, in Saratoga, and having a good time, such as 
he and they loved. They were waiting for the verdict, 
chatting, joking, smoking, drinking, gaily anticipating the 
result, more as a new sensation than anything else, and 
among them was none more gay than Barnard himself. He 
had no fear of any crushing disaster, and his character would 
shine all the brighter in contrast with that of Cardozo who 
had so meanly shrunk from the very appearance of danger. 

At length the news arrived, and it fell upon them, in the 
midst of their hilarity, like a thunderbolt. Their sudden 
silence and unuttered curses told the tale. More than their 
anticipated " worst" had happened ; for ex-Judge Barnard 
sat before them stripped not only of his judicial honors, but 
forever disqualified '• to hold and enjoy any office of honor, 
trust or profit under this State." The vote for his deposi- 
tion had been unanimous. Two Senators, Johnson and Lord, 
■ — more, I imagine, out of sympathy for the fallen man than 
from a rigid sense of justice— had voted against his dis- 



404 THIRTY YEARS Ot NEW YORK POLITICS. 

qualification. In pronouncing the sentence of the Court on 
Judge Barnard, Judge Grover, of the Court of Appeals, 
said : " 1 am happy to see from the votes we have given that 
his hands are unstained by bribery. Let it not be said here- 
after of Judge Barnard that, for the purpose of personal 
gain, or filthy lucre, he has consented to pervert justice. I 
am happy to bear the further testimony in favor of Judge 
Barnard, that, upon the trial of criminal cases, we have heard 
no complaint of his conduct ; upon the trial of important 
civil suits he has fairly and uprightly discharged the duties 
of a just and upright Judge, according to the best of his 
abilities. The errors into which he has fallen are somewhat 
akin to some of the nobler virtues." Judge Peckham said: 
" I agree in everything that has been said in favor of the 
defendant. I may add that my own relations with him have 
been kind, and I have known him for years." Chief Justice 
Church did not vote on the impeachment. 

Judge Barnard was a native of this State, born at Pough- 
keepsie, in 1829, and was one of seven brothers, all gradu- 
ates of Yale College, from which he received a bachelor's 
degree in 1848. He was a brother-in-law of Judge Samuel 
Jones, of the Superior Court, and son-in-law of John Ander- 
son, the millionaire tobacco-merchant. His wife died of a 
broken heart in 1874, after manifesting through all his 
trouble a most self-sacrificing devotion to her husband. The 
deposed Judge died in this City in April 27, 1879. 

The proceedings against Judge Ingraham were allowed to 
drop ; McCunn's case was transferred to the Senate, by 
whom it was subsequently tried. To the charges laid before 
the Senate, McCunn entered a demurrer, on grounds similar 
to those urged against certain articles in the Barnard im- 
peachment, viz. : that, if the acts therein referred to were 
committed at all, they were committed before the month of 
]N"ovember, 1869, when he was re-elected to the position he 
then held, and after all such charges had been made public. 



DEATH OF AN ACCUSED JUDGE. 40.') 

Defeated on the deimirrer, the trial was j^roceeded with, 
and after a hearing of several days, during which charges of 
embezzlement and misappropriation of moneys, to a large 
amount, were proved against him, he was removed from 
office by a unanimous vote of the Senate. 

There was an element of tragedy and poetic justice in the 
circumstances surrounding the fate of ^^cCnnn, which one 
seldom meets with in real, and especially, in official life. 
Swift and severe, indeed, was the stroke of retribution 
which fell upon the head of the erring Judge. It was 
a vindication of right divine, no less than human, which 
invests this episode in the history of New York politics 
with a most suggestive solemnity. Hurrying from Albany, 
after the fatal sentence was passed, in a half-dazed manner, 
to his home in New York, McCunn shut himself up in his 
bed-room, scarcely permitting even the members of his own 
family to see him, as if to hide his great shame from the 
world. Here he remained for three days, when he died, 
smitten by remorse and shame. 

The story of his life furnished a lesson which I do not 
think has been quite lost. Originally a common sailor, and 
born of humble parentage, in County Derry, Ireland, he 
landed in New York when quite a youth, penniless, and 
without a friend. After working for some time in a menial 
capacity, about the city docks, he managed to make the 
acquaintance of Charles CConor, and that great lawyer, who 
lived to attend his funeral and stand by his grave, aided him 
so well that, when little over twenty-one years of age, 
he got admitted to the New York Bar. Very soon after, lie 
began to take a part in politics and with unusual rapidity 
made his way to the position from which he was finally de- 
posed. 

Had McCunn been only half a wise man, he would have 
been satisfied with this great measure of success. The 
temptations of his position, however, were too great for one 



406 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

to whom love of money was becoming a passion. Fortune 
had been kinder to him than to most men, but the gifts of 
the goddess did not come quickly enough to satisfy his 
growing fever. 



LETTER XXXIV. 

Solving a Political Enigma— How and Why Democrats 
Supported a Rkpublican for President— Popular Dis- 
gust at Radical Recklessness and Despotism — Well 
Designed but Unsuccesskul Coalition for Peace and 
Prosperity — Attempt to Expel Greeley from the 
Union League Club — The Chappaqua Philosopher on 
HIS Farm — His Goodness of Heart and Rural Sim- 
plicity — Interviewed by the Female Suffragists — 
Characteristic Anecdotes. 

My dear Dean: 

Yon may have experienced some surprise, after reading 
the hitter tirade of Horace Greeley against the Democracy, 
to which I liave called your attention, that so intense a 
partisan as he should, in the year 1S72, have been endorsed 
as a Presidential standard-bearer by the Democracy. This 
somesvhat remarkable episode in our political history I will 
endeavor to explain. 

In 18T0, '71 and '72, the Republicans had gravitated to the 
servile position of a Grant party ; and the conditions of the 
country were strikingly similar to those which existed at 
the beginning of the century. In the year 1800, two an- 
tagonistic systems of government under one Constitution 
wrestled with each other for supremacy. John Adams, the 
President, was a candidate for re-election. He was the 
representative of an interpretation of the Constitution which 
looked to a " strong government " of force, able to maintain 
itself and its will by its own Federal power. The Alien 
and Sedition Laws of 1797 were typical of that tendency 
toward a centralized power, outside, independent of, and 
above the several States " and the people thereof." Op- 
posed to this, a new party was formed, under the leadership 

4or 



408 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of Thomas Jefferson, with that distinguished Virginia 
statesman and philosopher for its Presidential candidate. 
This party sought to maintain the legitimate power of the 
Federal government strictly within the limits defined by 
the Constitution ; but it also upheld the reserved rights of 
the States, and of the peoj^le, and vowed to defend them 
against encroachment by the central power. In its results, 
that election exerted all the power of a successful revolu- 
tion. Under Jefferson, as President, the whole character 
of the government was changed ; it was suddenly trans- 
formed from an aristocratic to a democratic republic. The 
semi-regal formality of the one was abandoned for the sim- 
plicity of the other ; there were no more speeches of the 
President to Congress, and addresses by that body to the 
President, modelled after the speeches from the English 
throne and the humble address of Parliament ; in a word, 
the Democratic-Republican part}'^, under Jefferson, wrought 
a transformation, liberalizing the government in every 
respect. 

After more than seventy years, the conditions of the 
country were almost precisely at the point and upon the 
same ground where our fathers had stood and fought at 
the opening of the century. On one side was arrayed the 
Federal Administration, with all the " pomp and circum- 
stance " of overgrown power, demanding a further continu- 
ance in office, in the re-election of President Grant. The 
tendency to centralization, to all the grandiose forms which 
power assumes to overawe when it cannot command respect, 
was personified' in the military appendages of the President. 
The Ku-Klux Bills, suspension of the "Writ of Habeas 
Corpus, the Bayonet Election bills — all of these corre- 
sponded to the Alien and Sedition Laws of John Adams' 
Administration. And as a consequence there was mani- 
fested within the Republican ranks a feeling that it was 
high time to " turn over a new leaf,'' and, having sufficiently 



LIBERAL REPUBLICAN MOVEMENT. 4(K) 

lionorod Gcneml Grant for the services he liad rendered 
during the Civil War, once more to make military subservi- 
ent to civil law throughout the land. 

The outgrowth of this sentiment was the organization of 
what was known as the Liberal-Republican party, of which 
C^arl Schurz, Senator Trumbull, and other j)rominent Re- 
[)ublican leaders were exponents, and a call was issued for 
a National Convention to be held at Cincinnati, in the 
month of May, for conference, and to " take such further 
action as might be deemed necessary." The Radicals ridi- 
culed this manoeuvre, continued the development of their 
])urpose to renominate Grant, and called their National 
Convention at Philadelphia, in the month of June ; while 
the Democrats selected Baltimore for holding their National 
Convention, in the month of July. 

Here I should perhaps explain that the term " Radical " 
with us was applied to the extremists of the Republican 
]iarty and to the policy of force which they advocated in 
dealing with the conquered Southern States, while with 
you, in England, as I understand, the same term designates 
advanced Liberal or ultra-popular opinions. 

It was made clear at the Presidential election of 1868, 
when Horatio Seymour was beaten by a large majority of 
the electoral vote, that the people of the Northern States — 
much as they had tired of the grasping power of Radical- 
ism — were not quite prepared to trust the Democratic party, 
M'hich as yet had no firm foothold in the North, except in 
the States of New Jersey and New York, and the leaders 
of the Democratic party were free to acknowledge that their 
only hope of recovering their former prestige in the North 
and of winning in a Presidential contest, was to weaken the 
opposition party by an encouragement of the pending 
rupture in its ranks. A consultation with the leaders of the 
Liberal-Republican movement was asked for and conceded. 
This resulted in the proposed adoption by the Cincinnati 



410 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Convention of a platform which would permit a union of 
all progressive Democrats with the Liberal-Republicans ; in 
return for which came an assurance from the Democrats 
that the selection of a nominee who would accept and stand 
upon such a platform would, no doubt, receive a hearty en- 
dorsement from their side of the house. 

Hon. Waldo Hutchins, of Westchester County, N. Y., 
was one of the prominent Republicans who had become 
heartily disgusted with the Grant Administration, and, 
being a very active participant in the formation of the 
Liberal-Republican organization, he took it upon himself 
to confer with his neighbor, Horace Greeley, also a resident 
of Westchester County, on the situation of affairs. Find- 
ing him in hearty sympathy Math the anti-Grant movement, 
Hutchins conceived the idea of suggesting to his associates 
in the Liberal organization the nomination of Mr. Greeley, 
one of the most-widely known Republicans in the Union, 
as the most available candidate to draw support from the 
regular Republican party; and, the suggestion meeting 
with an earnest welcome, Horace Greeley became the chosen 
nominee of the Liberal-Republican National Convention. 
Mr. Greeley was an enthusiast for freedom. He insisted 
on freeing the negro slaves because he believed it wrong 
that one man should own the body or labor of another. 
Slavery had been done away Avith ; but other lamentable 
conditions had arisen. While the blacks in the South were 
free and were masters of their own labor, the whites were 
slaves — slaves to a political oligarchy almost as bad as the 
Avorld had ever seen. Greeley was still true to his princi- 
ples. Advocating freedom for all mankind, he took the 
stand that " the white man in the South was as good as the 
negro, and should be treated like a free man and not like a 
slave." This was all the Southern Democrats asked for ; 
and, with such an avowal on the part of Mr. Greeley, it 
did not require any coaxing, when the Democratic National 



GREELKY AS A PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE. 411 

Convention asscniblocl, to secure their support ft)r a man 
wlio was op})Osed to the o])pression then meted out to the 
Southern States, seven years after the close of the Civil 
War, and especially one wh(» had had the moral courage, 
notw itlistanding the op[)osition of many of the leaders of 
the party of which he had been the head and front, to he- 
conie one of the sureties of the fallen chief of the Southern 
Confederacy, Jefferson Davis. 

rarentlietieally, I may here remark, that, because of 
Greeley's signing the Jefferson Davis bail-bond, an effort 
was made, on motion of George W. Blount, of this City, to 
expel him from the Union League Club. This proceeding 
roused Greeley to a white heat, and he addressed to the 
president of the Club one of his most characteristic letters, 
whicli was as follows : 

"I shall not attend your meeting this evening. I do not recognize 
you as capable of judging or even fully apprehending me. You evi- 
dently regard me as a weak sentimentalist, misled by maudlin philoso- 
phy. I arraign you as narrow-minded blockheads, who would like to 
lie useful to a great and good' cause, but do not know how. Your 
attempt to base a great, enduring party on the heat and wrath neces- 
sarily engendered by a bloody Civil War is as though you should plant 
a colony on an iceberg which had somehow drifted into a tropical ocean. 
I tell you here that, out of a life earnestly devoted to the good of 
humankind, your children will recollect my going to Richmond and 
signing the bail-bond as the wisest act, and will feel that it did more 
for freedom and humanity than all you were competent to do, though 
you had lived to the age of Methuselah. I ask nothing of you, then, 
but that you proceed to your end in a brave, frank, manly way. 
J">on't sidle off into a wild resolution of censure, but move the expulsion 
which you proposed, and which I deserve if I deserve any reproach 
whatever. I propose to fight it out on the line I have held from the 
day of Lee's surrender. So long as any man was seeking to overthrow 
our government, he was my enemy; from the hour in which he laid 
down his arms, he was my formerly erring countryman." 

The effort at any censure whatever of Greeley by the 
Union League Club utterly failed. 

Perhaps the best illustration of the popular sentiment of 
the period can be gathered from the brief address made by 



413 Thirty years of new york politics. 

the cliairman of the delegation of the Liberal-Republican 
organization appointed to wait npon Mr. Greeley and 
tender him the Presidential nomination. Mr. Greeley was 
found in the midst of a company of friends and neighbors, 
seated in a beautiful grove on his farm at Chappaqua, West- 
chester County, I^. Y., and he had prepared a rural repast 
for his visitors, his desire being to make the occasion more 
a social than a political gathering. After the repast, Col. 
Benjamin A. Willis spoke as follows : 

"I am glad to meet you, ladies and gentlemen, gathered under the 
shadows of this beautiful grove. We are told that the philosophers of 
antiquity met in the grove to hold high discourse of reason and poetry. 
IIow fitting, then, is it for us to meet in this grove to do honor to a 
higher philosopher than any of them— to Horace Greeley. (Prolonged 
cheering.) Grant's great cry was, ' Let us have peace ! ' But to day he 
is the most formidable foe of peace. The government has been prosti- 
tuted to one-man power. Republican government means a government 
subject to the people's will ; ours is subject to that of a despot. But 
we have met here, not so much to complain of Grant as to show our 
regard for the next President of the United States. (Cheers.) I, who 
fought with Grant, and who voted for him, cannot avoid saying that he 
is using every means within the power of his high office to secure his 
election for four years more ; nor has he stopped here, but assumes 
powers that disgrace his office and the country. He has assailed each 
cardinal principle of Republican government, and made his name and 
position a byword throughout the world. The outrages he has com- 
mitted culminated in the Cincinnati Convention, and the Democratic 
party allied itself with that movement to correct abuses the country 
was subjected to. The honest men of both parties wanted reform. 
The Democrats have no hope for it but in the election of Horace Greeley. 
Grant's followers superciliously ask how they could support the life- 
long opponent of the Democratic party ? This is a new party, one 
which throws aside issues and adopts the principles of Jefferson, (con- 
tinued cheering,) and Horace Greeley is our exponent. Where free 
speech and a free press exist the national intelligence of the people 
detects danger. When one issue is dead another arises, and a new 
party is necessitated. This is our case. This is a popular movement, 
and popular movements sweep in currents. Hence this uprising — 
North, South, East and West. The cry comes : ' Banish corrupt men 
from offices, give us the principles of the Cincinnati platform, and for 
President one whose name is above reproach — Horace Greeley.' My 
friends, this departure means peace and prosperity." 



LUKEWARMNESS OF THE DEMOCRACY. 41.1 

There were many Southern and Western gentlemen 
present, and all joined in hearty congratulations to Mr. 
Greeley, who, after much cheering, was loudly called for, 
and after some hesitation stepped forward and said : 

"Ladies and Gentlemeu : It was once said by one Irish orator of 
another, that ' he never opened his mouth but what he put his foot in 
it.' One of the ideas of a candidate for the Presidency is that he 
always commits a mistake of the same nature. Their friends always 
advise them not to talk, although they might talk if they did not say 
anything ! I was suddenly plunged the other evening into a gather- 
ing — a social dinner of college graduates. It would have been easy for 
me to make excuses against going there ; but I went. I was entreated 
to speak, and did speak for three minutes on the subject of education. 
It was at once reported around the country that I promised to give the 
government the control of the education of the American people. The 
impression was sent abroad that I favored placing within the sphere of 
the Federal Government all matters of that kind. The gcntlcmea who 
have come to hand me an official notification of my nomination will, 
therefore, I know, excuse me from saying anything at this time and 
place. As for you, my friends and neighbors for more than twenty 
years, it has been my chief delight to spend one day at least in the 
week among you. I have enjoyed myself in your society and I have 
had the recreation which my physical nature required in working on 
my farm. These reunions were very gratifying to me, but the critical 
state of my wife's health, and the ill-natured and I must say imperti- 
nent remarks and criticisms of certain journals have rendered these 
gatherings a source of uneasiness and discomfort to those who have 
united with us. You will, therefore, kindly cease your visits for the 
next few months ; then, in November, the election will be over, and I 
trust that we shall, after that, have occasion to meet in this grove and 
renew our expressions of friendly regard toward each other, and hope 
and pray for each other's long life and p^ospe^it3^ I trust these few 
remarks will not be incorrectly reported." 

After the cheers which followed, one of Mr. Greeley's 
enthusiastic neighbors could not restrain a few words to 
show the visitors how much '' the next President," as he 
called the Chappaqua philosopher, was thought of in the 
neighborhood ; and, in the midst of merriment created by 
his concluding statement that " every woman in Westchester 
■was for Horace Greeley — to a man," the assemblage dissolved 



414 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

for social enjoyment, with more clieers for Greeley, and 
especially the ladies. 

Greeley's letter of acceptance of the nomination for the 
Presidency ended with this notable passage : 

"With the distinct understanding that, if elected, I shall be the 
President, not of a party, but of the whole people, I accept j-our nomi- 
nation in the confidential trust that the masses of our countrymen, 
North and South, are eager to clasp hands across the bloody chasm 
which has too long divided them, forgetting that they have been ene- 
mies in the joyful consciousness that they are and must henceforth re- 
main brethren." 

The fraternization of men from North and Sonth, the 
brotherly nnion of representatives from the coral reefs of 
Florida, the sandy beaches of Jersey, and the gold coast of 
the Pacific, in the support of a recognized champion of free- 
dom, was regarded as an evidence of assured success. But 
the entire bulk of Democratic voters coukl not be brought 
to view the current of the tide in its true liglit. The stu- 
pendous revolution out of which the candidacy of Horace 
Greeley was born was not easily comprehended by the 
masses. Rather than contribute to their own success under 
his leadership, they failed to give him their support ; and 
while Democrats refrained from participating actively in the 
battle in sufficient numbers to overbalance by far the liost of 
Liberal deserters from the Republican ranks, others insisted 
upon holding a Rump convention at Louisville, Ky., and, in 
face of his absolute refusal, nominated Charles O'Conor, of 
'New York, as a candidate for President, and, supporting 
him at the polls, managed still further to demoralize their 
party. They were unable to divest themselves of old-time 
prejudices against one who had been their powerful political 
opponent. They did not rise to that height of statesmanship 
occupied by the leaders of the party, and, from motives of 
sincere though misguided and ill-judged party fidelity one 
of the most brilliant strategetical moves ever attempted iti 
the field of American politics, proved an overwhelming 
failure. 



rr,H.srSTEN(Y of woman SIFFKACISTS. 415 

Scarcely a month after the noiiiiiiatioii of Mr. (ireeley, 
for the rresideiiey, his old journalistic rival, James Gordon 
Bennett, departed this life; and on the thirtieth day of 
November, 1ST2. before the votes which had been cast for 
him had been otiicially canvassed — though his overwhelm- 
inty defeat was conceded the day after election — Horace 
Greeley was numbered among the dead. Henry J, Ray- 
mond and James Gordon Bennett preceded Greeley on the 
dark and unknown voyage of the hereafter ; but neither of 
the two former left such a void as did the last and greatest 
of the triumvirate of famous editors of the New York 
press, whose capability of achieving lasting results was un- 
e(]ualled. No other man of his time contributed a tithe of 
what Greeley did to shape the events of this continent and 
influence the destinies of the Republic. Fierce, fiery and 
unrelenting while wrestling witli an enemy, he relaxed his 
anger and lield out the hand of friendship and brotherhood 
to the vanquished, as soon as the contest was decided. It 
was this intuitive leaning to the side of mercy and fra- 
ternal benevolence which, in the eyes of thousands of his 
earlier friends, appeared as an eccentricity, a weakness, in 
Mr. Greeley, but which met the heartiest approval of his 
former antagonists. It was the proverbial divinity of for- 
giveness in his composition that captivated the broken heart 
of the conquered South — that brought millions of his former 
Democratic opponents enthusiastically to his support. 

The death of few men in our country was .ever marked 
with such manifestations of public grief as was the demise 
of Horace Greeley. Not only in the metropolis, but 
throughout the country, tlie same evidences of general and 
genuine sorrow and sympathy were exhibited. There is 
little doubt in the minds of his friends that he was broken- 
hearted and humiliated l)y his defeat, and the labor and 
strain of the canvass were, in his overworked and prostrate 
condition, more than his constitution could stand. 



41fi THiRtY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Reminiscences of such rare characters as Horace Greeley 
are always interesting, and I shall close this letter with one 
or two incidents which, I think, may entertain you. 

During the canvass for the Presidency, Mr. Greeley was 
of course much pestered by interviewers. A Western 
woman, named Mrs. Fernando Jones, who came to New 
York to attend the National Female Suffrage Convention, 
was very anxious to know how he stood on the "Woman 
Suffrage question, and she asked Susan B. Anthony, the 
perennial Suffragist, what she thought about her getting 
him to " declare his intentions" on the subject uppermost 
in their minds. Susan told her it was useless to try to get 
an interview with him on that question just now. But 
Mrs. Duniway, editress of a Female Suffrage organ in the 
Far West, said she " was not afraid to beard the lion in his 
den." So she and Mrs. Jones undertook the job together ; 
and this is the report Mrs. Jones gave of the interview : 

" We had much difficulty in gaining admittance to the white-coated 
philosopher, but we were persistent, and finally entered Mr. Greeley's 
den. When we had introduced ourselves, Mrs. Duniway came right to 
the point, saying : ' I am editing a paper in Oregon ; I am opposed to 
Grant ; and hence would like to have your opinion on the subject of 
Woman Suffrage, to lay before the people of Oregon. We want to 
know what we are to expect of you.' 

Mr. Greeley — ' Oregon is a very uncertain State. There is too much 
whiskey in that locality. There are many more saloons than school- 
houses.' 

Mrs. D. — ' There are not as many saloons in proportion to the popula- 
tion as there are in New York, where you ought to have considerable 
influence. In my opinion, this is the most God-forsaken place I ever 
saw. I think, sir, you ought to have done more for your own city.' 

Mr. G. — ' Humph ! yes.' 

Mrs. D. — ' Here is a copy of the New York Tribune of 1859, in 
which you advocate not only Woman Suffrage, but contend that women 
should be eligible to office. I understand that you have said that you 
have not changed your mind on the subject.' 

Mr. G. — ' That's wrong. What I did say was that I had not changed 
my opinion within the past four years. I have two daughters, and I 
would prefer that they remain women.' 



CHARACTERISTIC GREELEY ANECDOTES. 417 

Mrs. D.— ' What do they think about it ?' 

Mr. G.— 'I don't know. One of them is a Roman Catholic, and I 
don't think she cares much about it, either one way or anotiier. Tlio 
other would rather go to the theatre tiiau a Woman's Suffrage meet- 
ing.' 

Mrs. D.— ' I think either one of them might be better than they arc, 
and I think you are responsible. What do you think of women holding 
ollice f 

]\Ir_ CI.— I think they ought to stay at home and attend to their 
household duties. The women at the U. S. Treasury Department have 
become very much demoralized.' 

Mrs. D. — ' Do you mean to be landerstood that all those women are 
demoralized ?' 

3Ir_ C,. — 'No, not exactly ; but I believe some of them are not as 
good as they would be if they had never scjn Washington.' 

Mrs. D.— ' I had an idea that you might wish to place yourself on 
record as favoring Woman Suffrage, since there is a strong probability 
that it will be successful at no distant day.' 

Mr. G. — ' I have no ambition or desire to place myself on record. As 
you say, it may be successful. But it will be so only for a short time. 
It cannot endure.' 

Mrs. D. — ' I think it will continue as long as ^lale Suffrage; for that 
is about as corrupt as it can be.' 

Mr . G. — ' I think, when everybody else is in favor of this matter, I 
may be brought to think well of it. too ; but then it will be of no ad- 
vantage to you. I wish you a pleasant good-day, ladies.' " 

After slie had completed lier recital of the interview, 
Mrs. Jones was asked : 

" Well, what is your opinion of Horace ? " 
Mrs. Jones (indignantly) — "I think he is as ill-bred as a 
hippopotamus and as boorish as a clod-hopper. He appears 
to me like a fool ; but I am told he has had that appearance 
since he attained manhood." 

During the period of the Tyler administration, a promi- 
nent Hebrew, Major Mannassah M. Noah was editing a 
paper called The Union^ which was devoted to the political 
interests of the then President. Noah was especially 
antagonistic to Greeley, who was then a pronounced 
Whig, and was always trying to make points against him. 
So, one day, Noah started a story that Horace Greeley had 



418 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. • 

been seen taking his dinner in a Barclay sti'eet restaurant, 
along with two colored men. This brought out a card 
from Greelev, in w^hich he neither denied nor acknowl- 
edged the story told by ISToah, but declaimed emphatically 
against entertaining any prejudice against any man, on ac- 
count of either his race, religion or color. Then he '' went 
for" Noah, declaring that it was very inconsistent for a 
Jew to appeal to prejudice against other men, when the 
Jews themselves had so long and so bitterly suffered from 
prejudice. " Where there are thousands who would not 
eat with a negro," said Greeley, in his card, " there were 
until recently — perhaps there still are — tens of thousands 
who wo^ild not eat with a Jew. We leave to such renegades 
as Noah (the ' Judge of Israel,' as he is called) the stirring 
up of these vulgar pi^ejudices which to over one-half the 
world render him and his race an abhorrence." JSToah had 
no more to say regarding Greeley's restaurant experience. 

Greeley, when absorbed in the duties of his office, was 
always careless about his meals, and he got into the habit 
of depending upon one of his attaches, named Jones, to 
keep on the look-out for him in this respect. He would 
call out : " Jones, have I had my dinner yet ? " and so on. 
Once, while at the house of a leading politician, he had 
been having a heated discussion, when the politician's wife 
invited him to partake of some refreshment. Without 
heeding what he was doing, Horace seized a plate of 
crullers, and emptying the contents on his lap, continued 
his discussion munching a cruller every now and then until 
he had finished the lot. His kind-hearted hostess, fearing 
that in the absorption of the moment, Mr. Greeley had 
eaten so many crullers as to make himself sick, and having 
been told, that cheese, in moderation, was a capital digester, 
handed Mr. Greeley a small plate of cheese, hoping he 
would take a bite or two, and thus indirectly and uncon- 
sciously counteract the effect of the crullers. But Greeley, 



A PULVERIZING COMPARISON. 419 

in his excitement, treated the cheese ])recisely as lie had 
treated the crullers, and finally all the cheese disappeared, 
to the astonishment and alarm of his sympathetic hostess. 
A few minutes later, the discussion havinj^ ended, she was 
astounded to hear Mr. Greeley, evidently unconscious of 
what he had devoured, deliver an eloquent harangue on the 
virtues of (graham or brown bread, and denounce with 
vioor the pernicious fondness of Americans for cheese. 

Mr. Greeley was noted, among other peculiarities, for 
writing a most illeo-ible hand. Mark Twain and other 
humorists have entertained the public with some funny 
stories upon this subject. But Greeley himself never rel- 
ished them, and indeed was irritable when twitted on his 
peculiar chirography, and would insist that anybody could 
read his writing. He was not quite so good-natured on 
that subject as was Rufus Choate, the celebrated lawyer 
and orator, (uncle of our present Ambassador to England,) 
who was also noted for his illegible handwriting. In Court 
one day, while addressing a jury, lie had recourse to one of 
his own letters which had been introduced in evidence, 
and started to read it; but after the first sentence he 
stopped short, frowning, and evidently struggling to make 
out the words, when the opposing lawyer quizzically said : 
" xire you not able, Mr. Choate, to read your own hand- 
writing ? " Mr. Choate paused, looked a little perplexed, 
anJ then replied, good-humoredly : " You see, I have three 
styles of penmanship ; one I can read myself, another my 
secretary can read ; and the third (turning his back to the 
Judge and speaking in a lower tone) all hell can't read." 

Horace Greeley was Quakerish in his preference for 
simplicity of costume, and was habitually negligent of his 
attire. It was not a studied negligence on his part, for he 
M-as keenly sensitive on that score. His big brain gave 
scant heed to fashion plates, yet he disliked to be reminded 
of or caricatured for his frequent eccentricities of garb. 



420 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

This recalls a delightfully funny story which I have never 
seen in jDrint. 

A man who had learned type-setting and the rudiments 
of journalism in the same office with Mr. Greeley, when 
both were boys, achieved a failure as editor of a small sheet 
in Pennsylvania, and came to ]^ew York to solicit a place 
on the Tribune staff. His conceit equalled his incapacity, 
but Horace px-ovided for him (and temporarily got rid of 
him) by shipping him to Albany as an auxiliary correspond- 
ent. Although his matter had to be mercilessly carved or 
rewritten for the Tribune's columns, the new correspondent 
assumed considerable swagger at the State Capital Re- 
turning to New York at the close of the legislative session, 
he felt swelled with a sense of his own achievements. 

Walking into the editor's sanctum early in the afternoon, 
he found Mr. Greeley preparing to start for a meeting of 
Woman Suffragists whom he was to address. The Sao-e's 
greeting was friendly, but brief, for he was preoccupied 
and he knew his visitor to be a confirmed bore. As Horace 
was about to depart, the correspondent abruptly said : " Ex- 
cuse me, Mr. Greeley, but one of your galluses is hanging 
down below the tails of your coat." 

Depositing his satchel on a chair, and hastily pushing 
the obtrusive suspender out of sight, Horace turned upon 
the censor of his attire, and with caustic accent, exclaimed • 
"Anyhow, it'sad— n sight better than yot^/' Albany cor- 
respondence ! " 

None but a genius could have conceived so pulverizing 
a comparison ! 

I will conclude this letter with the last words that came 
from Greeley's lips, and winged his soul to its untraced 
flight: "It is finished." 




JS'oAn Davis. 



LETTER XXXV. 

First Trial of Tweed — Notable BarEnoaqed in the Case — 
What Made the Defendant So Confident of Acquittal 
— Ordeal Through Which the Jury Had to Pass — Testi- 
mony OF Two Star Witnesses — Garvey in Much Plaster 
and Tilden in a Tangle — How Counsel Gridironed the 
Statesman — Disappointment of the Judge at the Jury's 
Disagreement — Tweed's Caustic Comment on the Situa- 
tion. 

My dear Dean : 

Following the conviction and sentence of Edward S. 
Stokes, in January, 1873, for the murder of James Fisk, Jr., 
(of which more hereafter), the case of The People against 
William M. Tweed was on the calendar of the Court of 
Oyer and Terminer for trial. It came upon the calendar 
at the preceding term of that Court, as it had at other terms, 
and was moved off hy Tweed's counsel, who adopted every 
device for many months to postpone the triah Now, how- 
ever, on the 7th day of January, 1873, the counsel for the 
people insisted on proceeding with the case. Judge IS^oah 
Davis, elected Supreme Court Judge in the preceding P'all, 
on a reform ticket, as one of the results of the Ring dis-. 
closures, presided. 

The policy of the defence was to defer the trial as far 
away as possible from the period of the disclosures, in the 
hope that public indignation would in time cool down, 
so that the defendant would suffer no prejudice (as it was 
claimed) from public clamor. 

When the case was called, Tweed's lawyers moved for 
further delay, one of them stating that he had been six 
weeks preparing the case for the defence, and that he was 

421 



422 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

not "• yet through with the beginning of the beginning ; '' 
whereupon the Judge remarked that, " considering tlie 
brevity of human life, this rate of preparation would post- 
pone the trial to the next generation," and denied the 
motion. Then a motion was made to quash the indictment 
on several grounds ; which, after a long argument by coun- 
sel, was also denied. Once more, counsel came to the 
charge, and moved that the prosecution elect upon which 
of the counts in the indictment they should try Tweed. 
" Upon all of them," responded counsel for the people. 
'' What ? " said David Dudley Field, one of Tweed's coun- 
sel ; " there are fifty-five distinct offences charged, and four 
counts on each offence. This makes," he continued, ex- 
tending his hands towards the Judge, in amazement, " two 
hundred and twenty counts in all." 

" More counts than in a German Principality," said the 
Judge ; " nevertheless, your motion is denied." 

This grim pun of the Judge, followed so promptly by 
his adverse decision, impressed the defendant's lawyers that 
the new Judge was not to be lightly regarded, and after a 
hurried consultation they again came to the assault with 
various other motions, involving lengthy and presumably 
learned arguments, wherein, among other things, they de- 
sired to have the charges made more specific ; all of which 
the Judge denied, and peremptorily ordered the trial to 
proceed the next morning. 

Several indictments had been found against Tweed, in- 
cluding the one now before the Court, more than a year 
before ; but they were tossed about, so to speak, during the 
year from term to term, the trials on them being put over, 
on one plea or another, until the public at large began to 
look at the wdiole affair somewhat in the light of a practical 
joke ; and this was really the first time that any determined 
stand was taken. The majority of the oil Judges were, in 
their hearts, friendly to Tweed, and while the trials were 



THE FIRST TIUAL OF TWiaCI). 4-ia 

postponed from time to time, on ostensibly good grounds, 
it was believed by niuiy that this delay was the result of 
secret influence. 

But during the year the managers of the Tweed prosecu- 
tion, while niaking a show of resistance to the postj)()ne- 
iiients of the Ring cases, were in reality only too willing to 
have them go over, Both sides were working adroitly for 
the same thing, but from totally different uiotives. On the 
one hand, Tweed wanted delay in the hope that gradually 
the whole aifair would die out, and end as similar things on 
a smaller scale had done before. On the other hand, 
O'Conor, Tilden and Peckham knew that to try Tweed 
before one of the Eing Judges, which could be easily man- 
ao-ed by the King District Attorney, was to invite not only 
their own defeat, but perhaps a triumphant vindication for 
Tweed. The disclosures and indictments, together wnth 
the fulminations of the press, kept alive the public feeling 
against the plunderers ; and the sagacious prosecutors of 
Tweed were secretly waiting until the people would elect 
anti-Ring Judges and an anti-Ring District Attorney, in the 
fall of 1872. Their plans and their patience were rewarded 
by the verdict of the people at the jwlls. As soon as the 
new Judges and the new District Attorney were inducted 
into office, in January, 1873, the Tweed prosecutors were, 
for the first time since the indictments, really ready for 
business. 

Tweed was enormously wealthy in ready cash, and he had 
in his defence many leading members of the Bar, including 
David Dudley Field, John Graham, John E. Burrill, Wil- 
liam Fullerton, William O. Bartlett, Elilm Root, Wilhird 
Bartlett, and others of minor note. The people were repre- 
sented by the new District Attorney, Benjamin K. Phelps, 
and his assistants, Daniel G. Rollins, Wm. Lyon and others; 
and associated with them as special counsel, on behalf of the 
Attorney General of the State, were Lyman Tremain and 



434 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

"Wheeler H. Peckliam, who really liad full charge of the 
prosecution. 

It was a notable Bar in every sense. Tweed's lawyers 
were selected with good judgment. They were not only 
prominent, politically and socially, as well as learned and 
able professionally, but they represented the different par- 
ties and factions in politics, some being prominent Demo- 
crats, some prominent Republicans, and some, shining lights 
of Reform movements. With this combination of influ- 
ence and talent, behind the vast resources of the Ring, it 
was no wonder that the people at large scouted the idea 
that any serious harm could come to Tweed. Large crowds 
attended tlie Court during the very first days of the trial, 
and crowds attended in increasing numbers to the end ; but 
they were, for the most part, the followers of Tweed, and 
they came more for the novelty of the thing than through 
any apprehension that he would be convicted. 

Tweed himself came into Court with the same suavity of 
manner and gracious smile that had always characterized 
his entrance into the Senate Chamber at Albany. The 
passing joke of Judge Davis above referred to was highly 
appreciated by him, for he not only laughed at it, but, in 
doing so, looked at the Judge and half nodded his ap- 
proval. With the vast majority of the crowd that as- 
sembled in the Court-room he was as much an object of 
adulation as if he were seated in Tammany Hall in all his 
glory ; and, possibly, they were only restrained from giving 
him "three cheers and a tiger" by the presence of the 
Judge. 

Why did Tweed have this confidence ? The disclosures 
published in the !New York Times were conclusive, to any 
ordinary intellect, that the proofs of his guilt were at hand. 
Besides, the examination by Samuel J.. Tilden of the books 
and accounts of the Broadway Bank, wliere the City de- 
posited its funds, demonstrated to a mathematical certainty. 



WHY THE BOSS WAS SO CONFIDENT. 425 

that Tweed had stolen more than $1,000,000, and that the 
acro-reirate stealin<j;s by himself and others, amounted to 
S6,000,000. More than this, on the affidavit of Mr. Tilden, 
in a civil action, brought on behalf of the City to recover 
the $(), 000,001!), Judge Learned had issued an order for 
Tweed's arrest some ten months before, on which Tweed 
gave bail for $1,000,000. This latter case was not yet tried, 
and the general belief was that it never would be tried. But 
why should Tweed himself, who knew the truth of the 
charges, and of the existence of the proofs, be so confident 
that he could not be convicted i The answer is here. 

In 1S70 the King procured the passage of a law which 
was a most cunningly devised scheme to protect them 
from liarm in just such an emergency. Different from 
what had been the law, and different from the law applying 
to every other County in the State, the Commissioner of 
Jurors of the City and County of New York was made the 
sole judge of the qualifications of persons to be placed on 
the list from which Jurors were to be drawn. No property 
qualification was required, either real estate or personal, and 
under its provisions a pauper might be placed on the list. 
In order to keep up a semblance of the former law without 
impediment to the main object, it was provided that the 
Commissioner of Jurors '• may " excuse a Juror if he was 
not worth $250. Neither party at a trial had any legal 
right to object to a Juror on the grounds that he had no 
property qualification, because the law made the Com- 
missioner's judgment final and conclusive. The Com- 
mis'sioner of Jurors at that time was Douglas Taylor, a 
Sachem of the Tammany Society, and a member of the 
Tammany Hall General Committee of the Fifteenth Ward 
of the City. It was a fair presumption, on the part of 
Tweed, that his interests in that direction were in safe 
hands. 

On the eighth day of January, 1873, the work of select- 



426 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ing a Jury began. The Court room was crowded, aud 
those assembled had a rare day's fun. Each proposed Juror 
was put through a searching catechism. Did he read the 
papers, and, if so, what did he read? Did he read of the 
Ring frauds ? ' Did he know Tweed ? Did lie ever hear of 
his being charged with fraud ? Did he form an opinion ; 
if so, was it strong, weak, good, bad or indifferent, and was 
it changeable or unchangeable ? Did he hold office, or did 
he try to, and was he now willing to ? Did he go to political 
meetings ; and, if he did, why ; and what was it, and where 
was it, and what was his motive ? Did he know the local 
leader of the Ward he resided in ; did he ever drink at his 
bar ; if so, was he in the company of that leader ? Was he 
ever arrested, and, if so, who was the politician that got 
him out of jail ? Was he acquainted with any of Tweed's 
family, or with any of his relatives? Was he a member of 
any political organization, and, if so, what was it ? Was his 
memory good or bad ? Could he read newspaper articles 
and still be able to think for himself ? Was he, or was he 
not, of the opinion that he could give a conscientious ver- 
dict on the evidence, in compliance with his oath to do so ? 
And a hundred-and-one other pertinent or impertinent 
questions were put to him, to test his qualifications as a 
juror. 

If the proposed Juror said he belonged to Tammany Hall, 
or to any faction of the Democratic party, he was peremp- 
torily challenged by the prosecution ; and if he said he 
belonged to the Republican organization, he was peremp- 
torily challenged by the defence. After a nnmbt^r of 
citizens had been put through this ordeal, in which their 
entire careers were investigated, their innermost thoughts 
probed, and their motives for personal acts often impugned, 
at least by insinuation, the name of Louis Arnheim, clothier, 
of Third avenue, was called out by the clerk. 

Mr, Arnheim had never been summoned for Jurv duty 



SEAKCIIIN(; INVK8TU;.\TI()N OK IM{( )l'()Si;i) .11 KoKS. 4;.'7 

heiore, and the pnx-ess oH iiivt'stiy;afi(Hi of a jji-oposcd Jiii-or's 
titiiess was entirely new to liim. For over two liours, he 
had been watchino; intently the process in which his fellow- 
citizens (called to perform Jury duty at great sacrifice to 
their private interests), were relentlessly tossed al)ont and 
bantered, on the one side and then on the other, before a 
f^siv and snickering audience, and tinally cast aside as worth- 
less for such public service. Whenever the audience laughed 
at the answers of the victims, or the witticisms of the lawyers, 
Mr. Arnheim refrained from joining in the merriment, 
being conscious that the time was approaching when he 
himself would be on the rack, and perhaps the object of 
sport. 

A very nervous little man, of quick movement and alert 
attention, Mr. Arnheim jumped abruptly to his feet when 
his name was called, forgetting, for the moment, that his hat 
and overcoat were on liis knees. Both of these articles fell 
to the floor, and in his haste to pick them up, lie made so 
violent a plunge for them that his eyeglasses fell off his 
nose, and their recovery added to his delay. These mishaps 
naturally increased his nervousness, and to make up for lost 
time, he walked with such speed and recklessness towards 
the Bench that he knocked against several chairs on the 
way, augmenting his confusion. By the time he reached 
the witness chair he felt conscious that he had made a bad 
beginning, and he took his seat with as much trepidation as 
if he were on trial for his life. He was put through the 
entire formula. Among other things he admitted that he 
had heard of Tweed by reading the newspapers, but had 
formed no opinion as to Tweed's guilt or innocence. Then 
the examination, as appears by the record, proceeded as 
follows : 

Q. " Do you belong to any political organization ? " 

A. " No, not exactly, but I once gave a subscription to raise a banner." 

Q. " Ah ! a banner! who for ? " 

A. " I don't know. He was beaten at the election." [Great laughter.] 



428 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Mr. Arnlieiui, at this manifestation of innocence, was 
promptly accepted by both sides. One Bannin, aged about 
fifty years, was next called. 

Q. " What is your business ? '' 

A. "I am a gentleman." 

Q. " How old are you ? " 

A. "Under seventy-five." [Great merriment and nods of approval 
among the audience.] 

Mr. Bannin was rejected as unsatisfactory. The next was 
a man named Burnham. 

Q. " Have you read in the papers about the charges against Tweed? " 

A. "Yes." 

Q. "In what ?" 

A. "In the cars." [Laughter in which the Judge and Tweed joined.] 

Being asked what he had read particularly, he looked up 
to the ceiling, frowned in deep thought, scratched his head, 
and at length said : " I read the headlines ' Boss Tweed, the 
Boss Thief of the World.' " This provoked more laughter, 
in which, however, Tweed did not join. The defence re- 
jected Burnham as clear y incompetent. 

And so it went on, until the close of the day, when seven 
Jurymen were accepted and sworn in. In adjourning Court 
the Judge cautioned the Jurors that t ey must talk to no 
one on the subject of the trial, nor permit anyone to talk to 
them on the subject, or to talk of it in their hearing ; and 
if anyone insisted on doing so, it would be their duty to 
report it to him, and he would see that proper punishment 
was meted out. 

Next morning, the probing was renewed, and the lawyers 
on both sides instead of, as one would suppose, shortening 
the inquisitorial process, seemed to have grown more cranky, 
for they indulged in legal wrangles revealing abstruse learn- 
ing on the subject of competent and incomi^etent Jurors; 
.all of which, reduced to an analysis, M^as a conclusive 
demonstration that, if the proposed Juror read newsj^apers, 
it was an evidence of over-intelligence, clearly disqualifying 



"INTELLIGENT" CITIZENS BROUGHT TO THE FRONT. 420 

him, and if, on the other hand, lie did not read the news- 
pai)ers, lie was regarded, natnrallv enough, as not possessing 
sutRcient intelligence to sit on a dnry. • It became tedious. 
In one case, it took exactly two hours and ten minutes to 
find out that a proposed Jun.r was invincibly ignorant. 

But this dismal monotony was at last broken, when IJen- 
nison R. Parker (who, it was discovered after the trial, had 
been for years a '' bummer on the docks,") took the stand. 
He said he had been once a school teacher, once a i)olice- 
man, and was at present an oysterman. Then his examina- 
tion took this shape : ^ 

Q. " What papers do you read ? " 

A. "Any papers I can pick up." 

Q. ' ' Have you formed any opinion as to the guilt or innocence of Mr. 

Tweed ? " 
A. " The papers do not agree." 
Q. "So then you disagree ? " 
A. "Exactly so. I have formed no opinion." 

Then a new line was taken np : 
Q. "You sell oysters for a living ? " 
A. " Yes, sir." 

Q. " Where do you buy your oysters ? " 
A. " I don t buy them." 

Q. " How can you sell, if you don't buy them? " 
A. " I sell on commission. [Laughter.] 

Mr. Parker was accepted. 

A curious specimen was the next candidate, Zachariah 

Stern. 
Q "Have you an opinion on the question of Mr. Tweed's guilt ? "^ 
A " I have so decided an opinion that I won't give it up, nohow." 
" Then we give you up anyhow," said Tweed's counsel. 
Then there was another " intelMgent " citizen, a druggist 

named Thurston. 

Q. " What papers do you read ? " 

A. " The Times and Evening Post." 

Q. " Have you then formed an opinion ? " 

A. •' Yes, and nothing can change it." 



430 TfllHTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Q. " Wouhi uGt strong sworu evidence change it ? " 
A. " Not at all." 

Q. "You could not render an impartial verdict if placed on the 
jury •? " 

A. "Not at all." 

Two jurors were still lacking when the Court adjourned. 
IS'^ext uiorTiing the inquisition was renewed. But before it 
hegan, Mr. Peckham, for the people, precipitated a lively 
row, by stating that he had in his possession proof that the 
third Jnror, Michael Pifford, sworn in on the first day was a 
member of Tammany Hall, and was the special friend of 
" Bob " Clifford, chief clerk under Tweed, as Commissioner 
of Public Works, and asked to be allowed the right of chal- 
lenging him peremptorily. 

Mr. Peckham declared that he had received information 
from two independent sources relating to this particular 
Juror. The defence made strenuous efforts to retain the 
Juror on the jjanel. Mr. "William O. Bartlett, one of 
Tweed's counsel, became quite excited during the discussion 
and in an ecstatic manner declared '' that there is not one 
of the counsel or the defendant who is not as pure as the 
prayers which childhood breathes to heaven above." At 
this point Tweed assumed a look of juvenile innocence. 
After a lengthy discussion, in which the defence insisted 
that Piffoi-d could not be removed after having been sworn 
in as a Juror, Judge Davis ordered him off the Jury. 

Henry Miller, the next person called, M'as a carpenter; 
had i-ead all about the Ring frauds. " I have read so much," 
he said, " that I don't know what to think about the charges 
of fraud." "Were some of the charges in your opinion 
excusive ? " he was asked. Evidently supposing that 
counsel said '* excessive," he answered promptly, " Well, a 
man may charge high, and not be a fraud ! " (Laughter.) 

He was challenged for favor and referred to the triers, 
selected by the Judge, who were to pass upon his compe- 
tency. 



JUDGE DAVls; HEADY FOK HUiSlNESS. 481 

This procotis requires a ishort explanation. 

Under the law the prosecution had five and the de- 
fence live peremptory challenges ; that is to say, when, 
as the result of an examination, a proposed Juror is 
found to he competent, either side nevertheless may exer- 
cise the right arhitrarily, and without any exphmation 
whatever, of setting him aside by means of a [>eremptory 
challenge. In an important case, each side reserves as 
many as possible of these challenges for future contingencies, 
and if either side has secret objections to a Juror, the Judge 
is called upon to select triers who are to determine, as a 
question of fact, whether or not tlie Juror possesses the 
necessary (pialitications. In the case of Miller, the prose- 
cution, not liking the moral tone of his comment upon 
those who ''charge high," and not desiring to lose one of 
their perem[)tory challenges ui)on him, which were now 
becoming exhausted, called for triers. Accordingly, the 
Judo'C named Mr, Aridieim, foreman of the Jurv, and the 
Juror next him, as the triers to pass u])on ]\rr. Miller's quali- 
fications. After the triers had consulted for some time, 
Judge Davis asked, " Are you agreed, gentlemen i " " I am 
••agreed,"' said Arnheim; "but the other Juror is iu>tl"' 
( A roar of laughter, in which the prisoner joined.) 

Mr. Robert A. Greacon was the next to be examined. 

(I. •• Have you been connected with any political organization '/ " 
\. "Yes, sir; I belonged to a campaisrn club that was workinjr 
laM election to elect a Iteform Mayor." 

(}. • Oh. then you voted for >rayor llavernieyer ? " 
\. " No, sir ; I voted for .Jimmy O'Brioii." (fiau.irlitiT on all sides.) 

.\t the cl()>e of tlic third day ••twelve good men ;ui'l 
true" were found in the .lury box ready for business; but. 
the hour being late and next day being Saturday, the pro- 
ceedings were adjourned until Monday morning. At the 
opening of the Court (.n Monday morning, January 13, 
;inothcr -cnsiitjon was created by I )i.strict Attorney Plielpr^, 



432 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

who stated in open Court that he had received communica- 
tions relating to some of the Jurors, of so serious a nature 
as perhaps to prevent the trial from going on ; that the in- 
formation had reached him so late that he was unable to 
consult with associate counsel ; and he asked for a recess of 
one hour for that purpose. 

This being granted, the counsel for the prosecution re- 
tired to an adjoining room, while speculation was rife as to 
the cause of this unusual proceeding. Finally it leaked out 
that the strictures were leveled at the eleventh Juror, who, 
it had been discovered, had been a member of the Americus 
Club, of which Tweed was the presiding genius. After 
discussing the subject, the prosecuting lawyers concluded 
that this in itself was not a good reason for the removal of 
the Juror, and all returned to the Court room; and, without 
a word of explanation, Mr. Peckham started off with his 
opening address to the Jury, which occupied the greater 
part of the day. 

He waded through mazes of figures, vouchers, statutes, 
which presumably he understood, but which were *' Greek" 
to the Jury. He explained how unfortunate it was that, 
for the offence charged, the statute only provided for one 
year's imprisonment, and a fine of $250. Next day the 
taking of testimony began, but little in this direction was 
done, the day being spent in numerous and lengthy argu- 
ments as to the admissibility of certain documentary evi- 
dence, and the no less lengthy decisions of the Judge. Thus, 
day after day, the trial dragged its slow length along, the 
Jury listening to arguments and testimony about vouchers, 
certificates, warrants, signatures, pigeon holes, Board of 
Supervisors, Boards of Audit, deposits, debits and credits, 
checks, items and totals, all of which had such a soporific 
effect on them that they had a hard struggle to keep their 
eyes open. There was not a single paper, or any evidence 
relating to it, that some one of Tweed's lawyers did not 



A NOTORIOUS INFORMER. 433 

make a long speech in poiiitinijj out objections to it. At 
leni^tli, Judge Davis said '' tlie ingenious objections of 
counsel were antagcniistic to any practical administration of 
Justice;" but this had no ellect on the op[)osing counsel, 
who seemed to have entered into a contest as to who con hi 
talk the longest on the smallest point. Part of their aim 
.'emed to be, to show skill in saying, in different ways, 
what their associates had already said, and in many in- 
stances, what they had already said themselves. 

On the ninth day of the trial, the monotony was broken 
by the appearance of Andrew J. Garvey on the witness 
stand, for the prosecution, and, if I must say it, as an " in- 
former." Garvey was a celebrated plasterer ; that is to 
say, he became celebrated in his calling because he charged 
over $3,000,01)0 for plastering the New Court House, when 
§500,000 would perhaps have been a reasonable price for it. 
But then it must be said, in extenuation, if not in exonera- 
tion, of this gigantic extortion, that he had to divide it 
with others '* for the good of the party." Some of Garvey's 
testimony looks as if it were inspired by malice, for it 
travelled into a domain which, only by a strained construc- 
tion, would seem to have been germane to the question at 
issue. Garvey testified that James II. Ingersol, (the cele- 
brated chairmaker who supplied $5,750,000 worth of fur- 
niture to the New Court House) came to him and said : 
"•The old man [meaning Tweed] wants $50,000 from me, 
$50,000 from you, $25,000 from Keyser, $25,000 from 
Miller, and $25,000 from Archie Hall." "Ingersol also 
said," continued Garvey, "that I must get somebody to 
take the money to Albany, somebody who could be trusted, 
to give it to Mr. Tweed personally ; and my brother John 
finally took the money to Albany and gave it to Mr. Tweed. 
He went to Albany that same night." 

Then Garvey told how Tweed had talked to him about 
the investigation of the affairs of the City, by the Senate 



434 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Committee, and liad declared tliat '' the only way to fix it 
was to buy up tlie Committee. Somebody's got to put up 
for it, and you must put up for it, too." 

During this testimony, Mdiich produced a profound sen- 
sation in Court, Tweed's face became crimson with rage, 
and lie glared so ferociously at Garvey, whom he had lifted 
from comparative poverty to great wealth, that Garvey 
shifted uneasily in his seat, his face twitching and his hands 
trembling ; whereupon John Graham, Tweed's leading 
counsel, partly rising in his seat and pointing at the witness, 
said, impulsively : " Watch that man's face as he looks at 
Mr. Tweed!" 

This created much confusion, and brought forth protests 
and objections from the prosecution. Judge Davis rapped 
for order and, looking at Mr. Graham, said : " Do you 
want me to appoint somebody to watch his face ? " The 
query restored good-nature, and the Court took a recess. 

During recess, Tweed followed Garvey into an ante-room, 
and twitching with rage and fury went towards him and 
kept muttering something in a low tone, as he fiercely 
glared at him. Garvey walked away in evident fear. 
Being asked what Tweed had said to him, Garvey answered : 
" His language was blasphemous." Garvey went on the 
stand again after recess, and literally " gave everything 
away." He was on the stand several days, and in the 
course of his cross-examination, referring to his departure 
to Europe after the R,ing disclosures, he stated that he had 
left because he feared assassination at the hands of the 
Ring. 

On the thirteenth day of the trial, came on the star wit- 
ness, Samuel J. Tilden. Mr. Tilden, who was then fifty- 
nine years of age, was known to be ambitious for the Gov- 
ernorship of the State, (to which he was elected the follow- 
ing year) and those opposed to him within his own party, 
as well as those outside of it, endeavored to belittle his 



TILDEN ON THE WITNESS STAND. 435 

services in the cause of He form, and to attribute liis stu- 
pendous elTorts against Tweed and Tweed's associates to his 
aspiration to obtain control of the Democratic party in the 
City and State for his own poHtical aggrandizement. His 
examination of the accounts of the Broadway Bank, in 
whicli he showed such marvelous ability in ferreting out 
the Bing frauds, made his testimony the most important 
])art of the trial. 

Wheeler H. Beckham conducted the examination for the 
]>rosecution, and he did not proceed far l)efore it became 
apparent that he and Mr. Tilden had rehearsed that part of 
the programme. They almost immediately plunged into 
the intricacies of book-keeping, accounts, deposits, war- 
rants, debits and credits, moneys, generally millions, which 
were an enigma to everyone present except themselves. 
Beckham and Tilden had all the play between them. Now 
and again, Tweed's lawyers, to show that they were not en- 
tirely ignorant of the subject, threw in an objection at ran- 
dom, only to be invariably overruled by the Judge, who 
looked as if he were suffering mathematical agony in fol- 
lowing the rapid rush of figures. The Jury knew as much 
of what Mr. Tilden was^ testifying about as if he had been 
speaking in the Sanscrit language. After a while the de- 
fendant's law^yers abandoned all interruption, not only as 
useless, but perhaps as dangerous to their reputation, in 
that they might only expose their ignorance. And so such 
great lawyers as Graham, Field, Fullerton, Burrill and 
Bartlett, never known to have been silenced before, sat 
there and listened, in utter despair, to the jargon of numer- 
als, of thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, 
and millions. It was plain that Tilden enjoyed how he had 
silenced them. 

After he had testified for some time, the witness stopped 
short in scanning an array of papers, which he had been 
carefully arranging on his knee, and said, blandly : " 1 will 



436 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS, 

say to counsel and the Court, that I am here as a sworn 
witness, to tell the truth, without fear or favor." This 
declaration of his intended fairness, before any one even 
attempted to impugn his motives, was seized upon by tlie 
defendant's lawyers as an opportunity to say somethino-. 
Fullerton asked, sarcastically : " Is that speech included in 
your sworn statements ? " and Burrill quickly added : 
" Tliat is the shortest speech, probably, you were ever 
known to make." At this point, Mr. Tilden and Mr. Peck- 
ham appeared a little tangled up in their figures, and Mr. 
Tilden, looking at the clock, said that it was so near one 
o'clock he would suggest that a recess be taken. The 
Judge complied with the request. After recess, Tilden re- 
turned to the stand refreshed, and proceeded to testify 
without the slightest interruption. 

It happened that when Mr. Tilden was testifying the 
next day, after Mr. Peckham had put him a question on 
some elaborate figuring, the witness turned to the clock 
again, and repeating his ruse of the preceding day, said : 
" Let us take a recess ; " whereupon Mr. Field arose, and, 
with mock courtesy and gravity, asked : " To what hour do 
you adjourn the Court, Mr. Tilden ? " The sally created loud 
laughter at Mr. Tilden's expense, but he answered quickly, 
" 'Till half past one." Judge Davis joined in the joke, 
saying, " So be it, gentlemen." 

But Tilden did not have such a pleasant time, during liis 
cross examination. When Field questioned him on a line 
wliich tended to impugn his motives in prosecuting Tweed, 
his irascible temper was aroused. 

Q. " Have you and Mr. Tweed been in violent political antagonism 
for years past?" inquired Mr. Field. 

A. " We haven't generally sympathized very much." 

Q. " Was there not a notable contest between the Young Democracy 
and Tammauy Hall, and were you not allied to the Young Democracy?" 

A. "I went to Albany and made a speech against the Charter before 
the Senate Committee of which Mr. Tweed was Chairman." 




WllKKI.KK II. Pl'X'KllAM. 



SHARP REPARTEE AND RETORTS. 4:;7 

Q. "There was a very violent contest, I believe, over lliat Ciiiirtcr?" 
A, " It did violence to no person, so far as I know." 

Judge Davis iuterposed by saying that the introduction 
of politics was not necessary. Field replied that lu; desired 
to show the animus of the witness. To another question, 
Mr. Tilden said, '' 1 was not attached to that side. I acted 
on my own hook." Q. " Well, as there were already two 
sides in the contest, yours must have been the third 
hook r' Mr. Tilden, in his noted sly way, and with pecul- 
iar emphasis, said : " My hook was an independent, per- 
sonal hook." This elicited laughter, in which the Judge 
joined. 

Mr. Tilden was visibly angry, and he shied off from the 
next question. When Mr. Field said " I didn't ask you 
that, Mr. Tilden," the witness snappishly replied, " You 
won't let me tell without interruption. Now^ just sit down, 
and I will answer you." (Laughter.) 

" Oh," said Mr. Field, •' thank you, Mr. Tilden ; hut, 
never mind ; I have been sitting some time, and it relieves 
me to stand up, if it's all the same to you." (Laughter.) 
Tilden was now very angry. 

Asked about some accounts in the Broadway Bank, he 
answered : '' There was a struggle at that time going on to 
oust the Comptroller of the City." " Was that struggle 
going on in the Bank ? " broke in Mr. Field, mockingly. 
This thrust and the laughter which followed so provoked 
the witness, that he seemed choking with rage, and he 
• stopped short. 

''Go on, Mr. Tilden," said Mr. Peckham, soothingly. 

'* I can't go on when he (Field) stands there, and brow- 
beats me." 

'' Oh," said Mr. Field, in surprise, " why, sir, I— I — I—" 

" Well, sir," Mr. Tilden interrupted, " I consider your 
conduct insolent and indecent." (Sensation.) 

Mr. Field, (calmly,) " Well, indeed, if the witness was 



438 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

not ill, as I think he must be, I should speak differently to 
this language." 

Mr. Tilden, (excitedly,) " You can speak as you please, 
sir. and so will I.'' 

Tliis display of temper continued all day, at intervals, 
showing the bitter feeling which existed on both sides. 
Tilden did not relish being made to appear as having 
political motives in the prosecution of Tweed, while the 
Tweed side \vas determined to make the public believe 
that he was scheming, and had been scheming from the 
first, to get control of the party. 

In this connection, Mr. Tilden admitted in answer to 
Mr. Field's probing questions that, while a member of the 
preceding Legislature, he introduced a bill having for its 
purpose the present prosecution ; and he admitted further 
that ex-Governor Alvoi'd, then an associate Member, told 
him that his bill was unconstitutional. 

Mr. Field : " Did you then say to Mr. Alvord that it 
did not matter, for before its unconstitutionality could be 
determined, Tweed would be tried and in prison ? " 

Mr. Tilden : " 'No, sir. You are, as usual, very imperti- 
nent." 

Mr. Field : " I now give the gentleman notice, that if 
he persists in this once more, I shall answer him in a way 
that will not prove agreeable to him. The witness must 
stop ! " 

Mr. Tilden (savagely): " Yes, and the counsel must stop.'' 

Towards the close of the session, a great rumpus took ■ 
place when Mr. Field objected to Mr. Tilden being assisted 
by his clerk in examining figures. Judge Davis stated 
that there was no great objection to this, and that he would 
allow anyone who understood the figures to give assistance, 
and he would give the same privilege to the other side. 

Mr. Field jumped up and said, " But, your Honor. I sub- 
mit that—'' 



TWEED'S CASE GIVEN TO THK JUUV. 4.S9 

Judge D.ivis : ''That's right, Mr. Field, always submit ! 
Crier, adjourn Court ! " 

Before Mr, Field could say another word, the Crier 
loudly adjourned Court, amidst general laughter at the 
Judge's play upon the counsel's submission. 

Day after day the trial went on, hotly contested on both 
sides, until January 80, when Judge Davis, after a charge 
of three hours' duration, gave the case to the Jury, lie 
concluded his charge in these significant words: 

"You are to discharge your duty in the light of the evidence and 
under the sanction of your oaths, and should bear in mind that there is 
no stain more deep and damning that a Juror may bring upon his own 
character, than by being false to his oath and bringing in a false verdict." 

After the Jury had retired and the Judge had gone to his 
chambers, tlie crowd lingered to await the verdict. The 
question with the vast majority of them, was not, w'hether 
Tweed would be convicted or not, but how many Jurors he 
'' had in his pocket." They lounged around, and chatted, 
joked, and smoked, in a good-humored fashion. Many 
Tammany Hall politicians were present, but their manner 
indicated a " sure thing " for Tweed. It was whispered 
that the Jury would acquit him, but no one even suggested 
an agreement to convict, for it was whispered about that 
the Boss had '' fixed things." Tweed and his sons were 
among the crowd, and were jovial and apparently happy. 

After waiting until half past ten o'clock, the Judge 
resumed his seat upon the Bench, and ordered the Clerk to 
announce an adjoui'nment until half past ten o'clock the 
following morning, the Jury being locked up for the night. 

Next morning the Court-room was again crowded. Tweed 
made his appearance with his sons, and looked absolutely 
confident. He received the greetings of his numerous 
friends with perfect coolness. 

At half past ten o'clock. Judge Davis sent for the Jury, 



440 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and when they filed into Court, so anxious were the 
audience, that nearly everyone present arose. 

As the Jury took their seats, Tweed and one of the 
Jurors exchanged glances. Then Tweed turned the back 
of his chair to the Jury box and, gazing at the ceiling, could 
scarcely repress a smile. He tried to look bored at the 
length of the proceedings that followed, as a wholly 
unnecessary waste of time. In fact, he yawned. 

Judge Davis, looking sternly at the foreman, said : " I 
understand you have not agreed." The foreman stood up 
and, looking at the Judge as if afraid to announce a dis- 
agreement, answered, " We have not." Still keeping his 
eyes on the foreman, the Judge paused, immersed in deep 
thought, which so disconcerted the foreman that, not know- 
ing what else to do, he sat down. 

" If the Jury had a little more time, do you think you 
might agree ? " asked the Judge, slowly. 

" No, sir ; I don't think there is any chance," answered 
the foreman. 

Again, there was deadly silence. After a pause of some 
seconds, the Judge, looking over the rows of Jurors, said : 
" Is there any other member of the Jury who desires to say 
anything ? " The ninth Juror stood up and said : " I 
agree with everything the foreman said," and then sat 
down. The face of Judge Davis was a study. It bore 
evidence of his deep mortification. The " Boss Thief of 
the World," had outwitted the Judge, the prosecutors and 
all their cohorts, and slipped aside with ease from the talons 
of the law, in a case of guilt as clear as crystal. Was it for 
this, that the cases against Tweed had been permitted to go 
over for more than a year, in order that new Judges and a 
new District Attorney might be elected, who would not be 
his tools ? And now, when the prosecution had not only 
all this, which they acquired as the result of the recent 
election, but had, besides, the help of the Attorney-General 



GROSS MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE. 441 

of the State, to liave this public malefactor go unwhipped 
of Justice, was not merely to have a bad moral effect on the 
community, but was a severe reflection upon the machinery 
of Justice. Besides, it was regarded as a serious set-back, 
])olitically, to certain " patriots " some of whom were pub- . 
licly, and others of whom were privately, from the start, ' 
behind the prosecution. 

Judge Davis, sincere in the ]niblic interests, was now 
convinced, that the hints given out during the progress of 
the trial, relating to some of the Jurors, were not idle 
rumor, and that there was a gross miscarriage of Justice. 
He gazed at the Jury, frowned, became flushed and pale 
by turns ; then settled down in deep thought, and at last, 
as if awaking from a reverie, said, gruffly : " You are 
discharged." 

When the Jury had gone, Mr. Peckham moved to retry 
the case without delay. A storm of objections met this, on 
the part of the defence. Field, Burrill, Graham and Bart- 
lett were on their feet all at once. At length, Mr. Graham 
was heard, and he protested, that after three weeks' work, 
to have them enter immediately upon another trial would 
exhaust the physical endurance of counsel. lie referred 
to Mr. Peckham as representing the State, who, of course, 
he stated, was happy to go on under the stimulus of large 
retainers ; " but," he added, " if Mr. Peckham j^roposes to 
make the business of hunting Mr. Tweed a continual 
occupation, Ave do not." 

Judge Davis said, after considerable deliberation : '' A 
more serious difficulty than the fatigue of counsel is in the 
way of a second trial at this time, and that is, as to the legal 
right to extend the present term of the Court of Oyer and 
Terminer." The case then went over the term, to be 
again brought up at some future time. 

In commenting on the trial, next day, Tweed said : " I 



442 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

am tired of the whole farce. It's only a political trick. 
Nothing in it ! No jury will ever convict me," 

He was asked how the Jury stood, and he replied : " I 
understand that they stood eleven for acquittal and two for 
conviction." "'But," said his questioner, ''that makes 
thirteen ; there are only twelve jurors ? " " There was one 
Juryman and a Judge against me," he answered. " Judge 
Davis was Judge, counsel, witness and Jury combined ; but 
I am not afraid of him. I am only fifty years of age; I 
have twenty years more to live, and I will live all this 
down." 

But he was mistaken. 



LETTER XXXVI. 

Running the Gauntlet a Second Time Before the Same 
Judge — Unsuccessful Attempt of Tweed's Counsel to 
Change the Situation — Extraordinary Legal Docu- 
ment — Unmistakable Annoyance Betrayed by the 
Judge — Sharp Retorts of Counsel and Court— Tac- 
tics OF THE Prosecution a Surprise— Jury Agree on 
a Verdict— " Guilty I " said the Foreman. 

My dear Dean : 

More than ten months elapsed, after the first trial of 
Tweed, in January, 1873, before he was again arraigned at 
the bar of Justice for a second trial. 

It is, perhaps, a strange coincidence that Tweed's first 
trial followed closely upon the heels of Stokes' first trial 
for the murder of James Fisk, Jr., in which Stokes was sen- 
tenced to death, and that, again, the second and last trial of 
Tweed followed closely the third and last trial of Stokes 
in which Stokes was convicted of manslaughter in the 
fourth degree, and sentenced to four years in State's Prison. 
Judge Davis presided at this last trial of Stokes, and as soon 
as it was finished, the Tweed case was pressed for trial be- 
fore him for the second time. 

I refer to these circumstances as peculiar, because, it 
must be remembered that, in the Stokes trial, there was 
involved much politics of the City and State, and the pub- 
lic mind was greatly agitated over the sombre, weird, and 
worse incidents of New York political life which were 
brought to light during the trial. Scandalous scenes were 
depicted by witnesses, in which political and judicial cor- 
ruption played a prominent and infamous part. The mur- 
derer virtually defended himself by attempting to show 

443 



444 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

that the murdered man was a monster, who was clothed 
with such wrongful power, partly bestowed upon him by 
Tweed and his corrupt Judiciary, and was so reckless 
and conscienceless in using it, that the community had 
a happy riddance of him. The public mind, inflamed by 
the disclosures in the Stokes trials did not get a chance 
to cool down before Tweed's trial, in each instance, was 
pressed by the prosecution. 

It was under these circumstances that, on the fifth day of 
November, 1873, the second trial of William M. Tweed 
came up, in the Court of Oyer and Terminer, before Judge 
Davis. The indictment was in book form of over one 
thousand pages, and it included two hundred and twenty 
different counts. Tweed appeared promptly at the opening 
of the Court, apparently chipper and happy, w^ith his 
splendid array of counsel, including most of the leading 
lawyers of the City — the same galaxy which had appeared 
on the former trial — now thoroughly conversant with testi- 
mony which, during the first trial, was involved in the com- 
plexities of Mr. Tilden's figures. Presumably, tfierefore, 
they were far better equipped for this than they had been 
for the preceding trial, as the entire hand of the prose- 
cution was laid bare before them in the stenographer's 
minutes of the former trial, which, during the past ten 
months, they had conned and studied to their hearts' con- 
tent. They were afraid of only one thing — that Judge 
Davis would try the case. This they were determined, at 
all hazards, to prevent. 

After a prolonged consultation the previous evening, 
they resolved upon a course which they had in contempla- 
tion many months, and which, however good in intention, 
brought severe judicial condemnation upon themselves, 
and, as some thought, over-severity to their client. As the 
result of their deliberations, Ex-Judge Fullerton, one of 
Tweed's counsel, at the opening of the Court, went 



AN EXTRAORDINAHV I.EdAL DOCUMENT. 445 

towards tlio IkMicli iind IuukUmI -liidiiv 1 );ivis a d(jcuinciit, of 
which the following is a copy : 

COURT OF OYER AND TERMINER. 



The Peoi'le, Etc., 

vs. 

Wiiii-iAM M. Tweed. 



Tlie Couasel for Wm. M. Tweed respectfully present to the Court 
the followiug reasons why the trial of this defendant should not be 
hud before the .Justice now holding the Court : 

First. The said Justice has formed, and upon a previous trial ex- 
pressed, a most unqualified and decided opinion, unfavorable to the 
defendant, upon the facts of the case ; and he declined to charge the 
Jury that they were not to be influenced by such an expression of his 
opinion. A trial by Jury, influenced as it necessarily would be by the 
opinion of tiie Justice, formed before such time, would be had under 
bias and prejudice, and not by an impartial Jury, such as the Constitu- 
tion secured to the defendant. 

Second. Before the recent Act of the Legislature of this State, pro- 
viding that challenge to the favor shall be tried by the Court, any 
person who had assumed a position in reference to this case and this 
defendant, such as said Justice has assumed, would have been dis- 
qualified to act as trier. The defendant is no less entitled to a fair 
trial of his challenges now than he was formerly. What would have 
disqualified a trier, must disqualify a Judge now. 

Third. Most of the important questions of law, which will be 
involved in the trial, have already been decided by the said Justice 
adversely to the defendant, and, upon some important points, his 
rulings were, as we respectfully insist, in opposition to previous decis- 
ions of other Judges. 

Although there may be no positive prohibition of a trial under these 
circumstances, it would be clearly a violation of the spirit of our 
present Constitution, which prohibits any Judge from sitting iu review 
of his own decision. 

The objection to a Judge, who has already formed and expressed 



446 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

an opinion upon the law, sitting in this case, is more apparent from 
the fact that in many States, where Jurors are Judges of law as well as 
facts, he would be absolutely disqualified as a Juror. 

David Dudley Field. J. E. Burrill. 

John Graham. Elihu Root. 

William Fullerton. Willard Bartlett. 

William O. Bartlett. William Eggleston. 

While Judge Davis was carefully reading this paper his 
face assumed a severe aspect. After reading it, he said : 
" This is such an extraordinary document, that I deem it 
advisable to consult my brother Judges, before proceeding 
with this case, as to what action should be taken in the 
premises." 

At the request of the prosecuting officers, Judge Davis 
handed them the paper for perusal. Its contents were dis- 
closed to no one else, and j)eople wondered what it could 
be that had so disturbed the Judge and occasioned a recess 
of the Court. AVhen the paper was restored to his custody, 
the Judge said, without further comment : " The Court 
will take a recess for one hour." 

After the Judge had retired, Tweed's counsel looked as 
if they had scored a brilliant point, and they predicted 
(among themselves) that Judge Davis would not venture, 
in the face of the protest, to try the case. They were 
therefore waiting on the tiptoe of expectation. The chief 
officer of the Court at last rapped for order, to announce 
the coming of the Judge, and all were hushed. 

Slowly, and with great dignity, Judge Davis resumed 
his seat upon the Bench. His face was flushed with sup- 
pressed emotion, as he said, with grave deliberation : '• In 
respect to the paper that has been handed to me, I and my 
brethren concur very fully as to the view I ought to take 
of it. Indeed, this extraordinary paper leaves me no alter- 
native, if I have any self-respect whatever, except to go 
on ; but I shall reserve, for a future occasion, such proceed- 
ings as, in my Judgment, are required to vindicate the 



UN.MISTAKAIU.Y ANNOVKD Jl DOK. 44T 

dignity of the Court, and of the profession itself, from 
what I deem a most unjustitiable proceeding." 

iMr. Bartlett— " I signed that document, believing that 
it was my duty, and I would do the same if your Honor 
was a saint from Heaven/' 

Judge Davis, (turning pale and knocking tiie bench with 
his gavel) — •' Sit down, sir! I have examined the charge, 
o-iven bv mvself, and it nowhere sustains any part of the 
statement, which 1 find to be unfounded as it is untrue. 
No further notice will be taken of this paper at present, 
but such action as may be deemed proper will be taken 
h(M-eafter. Proceed with the case." 

^Ir. Graham : " I wish your Honor would permit an ex- 
])lanation." 

Judge Davis : " I cannot allow any remarks on the sub- 
ject." 

Mr. (Iraham : "All I ask is an opportunity to show that 
the facts alleged in that paper are true." 

J udge Davis (peremptorily) : " No, sir ! " 

Mr. Graham : " You say, in the presence of Jurors sum- 
moned here, that we liave departed from the truth, and I 
say, in the presence of my Maker, that we have not departed 
from the truth." (Sensation.) 

Judge Davis (rapping with his gavelj : " Counsel need 
not have any fear but that an opportunity wnll be afforded 
them ; but not now." 

Mr. Graham : "We ought to be the best judges of the 
])roper time to prove that the paper was not untrue, and we 
want to prove it before the trial proceeds." 

Judge Davis (rapping again, decisively) : " The case 
must go on, now." 

^Ir. Graham asked to note an exception, but Judge Davis 
said : " No exception. Any lawyer can see that there is 
nothing to except to." 

Now thoroughly demoralized, the defendant's counsel 



448 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

held a biirried and, it iniglit be added, a flurried consulta- 
tion, and then Mr. Graham said: "Will jour Honor al- 
low us an opportunity to consider whether, after that dis- 
paragement, we ought not to retire from the case ? " 

Judge Davis (determinedly) : *' This case must go on. 
It must go on ! '' 

Mr. Graham: "I have to suggest whether we should 
not be allowed to send for counsel to advise us. If we 
determine to desert Mr. Tweed now, it will be impossible 
for him to obtain at once counsel competent to carry on 
his case.'' 

Judge Davis: "This case must proceed, sir. I shall 
give no time for counsel to mutiny against their client." 

Mr. Graham : " I except to the remarks of your Honor, 
and especially to the word ' mutiny.' My oath knows no 
such word as ' nmtiny.' " 

Judge Davis : " No exception will be allowed. Proceed 
with the case." 

Mr. Bartlett : " But we fear it will injure our client." 

Judge Davis : " Proceed with the case ! " 

The object of counsel for the defence doubtless was, first 
to force Judge Davis to surrender the case to some other 
Judge, and, failing in this, to enter into a discussion of the 
contents of the paper, in open Court, where they expected 
to make it appear that Judge Davis's hostility to Tweed 
took the form of judicial persecution, and that this, being 
made the subject of public discussion, would affect the 
minds of the Jury to be selected to try Tweed. It was 
evident that Judge Davis saw through the device, and he 
foiled it with admirable skill. 

Incensed at being so summarily checkmated, Tweed's 
counsel clustered together, looking crestfallen — like men 
who were beaten to a standstill ; but the most fiery of them, 
John Graham, who never before knew what it was to be 
suppressed, impulsively sprang to his feet, at the same time 



BEGINNING OF SECOND Till A 1, OF TWEED. •}!'.) 

seiziiiij; a le";al tome from a cliair beside liim, and wlieelin" 
about and lioldiii<i: the voluniL' aloft in liis ri^lit Ikiik), faced 
the Judg;e in siieh a])j>arently meTuu'in^ attitude tliat most 
oi the audience expected every moment to see the book 
living towards tlie Judge's liead. Wnat Judge Davis ex- 
pected just tlien at tlie hands, or rather from the hand, of 
John Graham, whose irate temper was well-known — and of 
which Judge Davis himself had unpleasant experiences 
during the celebrated McFarland umrder trial, Avhere they 
met as counsel at opposite sides — it is, of course, impossible 
to tell ; but, if the truth must be told. Judge Davis, at that 
particular moment, did look vei-y much disturbed. 

At last, Mr. Graham, who was almost choking with rage, 
caught his breath and thundered forth, in a loud and almost 
ferocious voice : " I object to the jurisdiction of this Court. 
I proclaim that this case does not belong here, under the 
statute ! " He then argued that the General Sessions alone 
had jurisdiction of offences specified in the indictment. 
Was this all, after all the fuss ? Judge Davis heaved a sigh 
of relief, and he evidently was relieved. Was this, really, 
all that Mr. Graham was to do ? Simply, to put forth a 
point of law, which had been completely threshed out on 
the former trial ? Why, this was easy ! Judge Davis 
snnled blandly and listened most courteous!}' to Mr. Graham, 
who, thus encouraged, much to his surprise, made his argu- 
ment a great deal longer than it ought to have been. At 
its conclusion, Judge Davis again, most courteously, re- 
viewed at some length Mr. Graham's points, and tlien, also 
most courteously, overruled his objections. 

Kow began tlie dreary process of examining those sum- 
moned as Jurors. While this was progressing, the proceed- 
ings were suspended by an investigation into the conduct 
of the eighth Juror in the Stokes' trial — which had closed a 
few days before, as already related — wdierein it appeared 
that this Juror, one James Delos Center, had during the 



450 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

trial gone into certain resorts and talked about Stokes' 
chances, and stated that it was safe to wager that he would 
not be convicted of murder in the first degree, and made 
many other similar remarks, in violation of the instructions 
given by Judge Davis that the Jurors must talk to no one, 
or permit any one to talk to them, on the subject of the 
trial. Judge Davis impressively condemned the Juror to 
imprisonment in the County jail for thirty days, and to pay 
a fine of $250. 

This was a solemn object lesson to the men who were to 
take seats as Jurors in the Tweed case, now in progress. 
Besides, it appeared in this investigation that the prosecut- 
ing authorities had in their employ a large number of 
Pinkerton's detectives, in addition to the corps of official 
detectives at the command of the District Attorney, to 
watch Jurors after they were sworn in, it being fully de- 
termined that "fixing juries" must stop as an efficacious 
f defence for noted and wealthy criminals. So dilatory were 
I the tactics pursued that the third day of the trial opened 
\ without a single Juror being sworn in. A law had been 
I passed, conferring on the trial Judge the power of triers, 
I and Judge Davis, having decided in favor of its constitu- 
tionality, proceeded to exercise that authority — a course 
which greatly expedited the proceedings ; but, when he 
attempted to do so, Mr. Graham objected, unless he took 
the same oath as the triers. Judge Davis looked scornfully 
at Mr. Graham, and proceeded to pass upon the qualifica- 
tions of one Orrell, and after considerable questioning, 
decided him to be competent. Whereupon Mr. Bartlett 
arose and drew the Court's attention to the fact that Orrell 
admitted a state of mind which was at variance with the 
prior rulings of the Court. 

Judge Davis: " I cannot hear any further discussion after my de- 
cision." 
Mr. Bartlett ; " Would your Honor be kind enough to hear " 



BITTERNESS OF BEN( II AND BAR. i'A 

Judge Davis : " I won't hv kind enough to hoar another word on the 
subject." 

Mr. Bartlett: " Will your Honor be kind enough to hear a word on 
another subject? " 

The Judge took no notice of him. 

Mr. Graham: ' As yo\ir Honor refuses to hear argument after de 
cision, will you inform us, when the next Juror is called, that you will 
hear argument before decision '? " 

Judge Davis : "Sit down! Sit down ! " 

Mr. Graham : " Will your Honor " 

Judce Davis (very red in the face and hammering away with his 
gavel) : " Sit down !'' 

Mr. Graham : " Allow me to refer you to an authority " 

Judge Davis : " What authority ? " 

Mr. Graham : " The authority of Chief Justice Chase, of the United 
States Supreme Court." 

Judge Davis: " Be cautious, sir, or I will refer you to a still later 
authority." 

Mr. Graham : ' What did I hear, your Honor? That " 

Judge Davis (bending forward and interrupting Mr. Graham) : "An- 
other repetition of that, or anyttiing of that character, will bring upon 
you something that will not be pleasant." 

The foregoing is a fair specimen of the bitterness ex- 
hibited during the entire trial. On November 12th, the 
seventh day of the trial, the day's work closed with only 
ten Jnrors in the box, although two panels had been ex- 
hausted, and they were now nearing the end of the third 
panel. Judge Davis, fearing interference with the ton 
Jurors already sworn in, determined on extreme measures, 
by ordering that they should be no longer allowed to go to 
their homes, but be confined under the charge of Court 
officers at the Astor House. 

On the 13th of November, two Jurors were yet required. 
Judge Davis was determined to waste as little time as pos- 
sible in selecting them, Init he met with many difficulties. 
For instance, a pleasant, good-looking German, Joseph 
Adolph ^larr, who would be ordinai-ily taken .^s a good 
specimen Juryman, in answering as to his qualifications. 



452 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

paid that he had been traveling iu Ohio and other Western 
States, and that the feehug against Tweed was very strong 
out there, and everywhere he went the people were making 
fun of him (Marr) on account of the New York frauds, 
and, " to tell the truth," said he, '' I believed then in hang- 
ing these people, but since I came back, well, I don't 
think them so bad." Mr. Marr was promptly rejected by 
the prosecution. , 

So adroit were Tweed's agents that they hired detectives 
to watch the detectives, and the fear prevailed among some 
of the gentlemen of the prosecution that one or more of their 
own detectives would be corrupted, as this would be the 
easiest way of all to approach a Juror. So, on the slightest 
suspicion, official detectives were relieved and others put 
in their stead. But, with all these precautions, one of the 
Jurors was approached ; and it was done in the most open 
manner, yet surrounded with absolute safety so far as any 
criminal or other prosecution of the culprits was concerned. 

The prosecuting counsel, on the afternoon of November 
13, asked that he be allowed a challenge to the favor to be 
opened in respect to the eighth Juror, E. 11. Lubry, who, 
he claimed, had been approached during recess by Police 
Captain Walsh. He asked that the matter be tried then 
and there in open Court. This being granted, two detec- 
tives (one from the District Attorney's office and one of 
the Pinkerton men who co-operated) swore that when 
recess was taken they had seen Capt. Walsh talk privately 
with Tweed, and then go out in the hallway and, meeting 
Juror Lubry, walk down stairs wath him and talk with him 
for about five minutes. After this, Capt. Walsh had returned 
to the room where Tweed was. It also appeared that 
Lubry was formerly the private barber of former Senator 
Thomas J. Creamer, who was a colleague of Tweed in the 
Senate. 

Capt. Walsh was sent for, but disclainied any improper 



JURY EMPANELLED AND SWORN IN. 4r>(\ 

motive in couveivsing with the Juror. Lubry corroborated 
this disclaimer. Having heard the testimony, Judge Davis 
decided in these words : 

"I cannot bring my mind to the conclusion that this transaction was 
entirely innocent. On the contrary, it is covered all over with sus- 
picion. Capt. Walsh, a friend of many years' standing, meeting the 
Juror, is not a circumsiance of grave importance ; but that he should 
chance to be located at the time with particular friends of the defend- 
ant, such as his private s( cretary, and hanging around the ante- 
chamber and talking with the party implicattd in the loss of thfl 
vouchers, and be there until the Jury left their seats, and then, with- 
out any intention of going home, shaking hands with the Juror and 
going down with him to the foot of the stairs, and anxious to know 
whether he was making plenty of money, and then coming back to the 
ante-chamber, covers the case with such suspicion that whatever ver- 
dict might be rendered would never be regarded by the public mind 
as an honest one. The Juror, besides, has not, in my judgment, acted 
with frankness in disclosing information that it was proper he should 
o-ive. He has been the intimate friend of a distinguished politician, 
and he never told us. It is my duty, which I perform with more pain 
than pleasure, to discharge this man from the Jury, and get in his 
place one more likely not to be accosted by anyone as to his pecuniary 
success in business." 

It took some time to secure another juror in Ltibry's 
place; after which, twelve jurors being empaneled and 
sworn, Mr. Wheeler H. Peckham opened the case for the 
prosecution. During the course of his speech he stated 
that it was unfortunate that the prosecution might be 
obliged to use the testimony of such a concededly l)ad 
chai^cter as Andrew J. Garvey. This declaration had an 
important bearing on the case. The defendant's counsel 
expected that one of the principal witnesses for the prose- 
cution in this, as he had been in the first trial, might be 
Andrew J. Garvey. They purposed to level all their guns 
on him when it came to their time to cross-examine him ; 
tlius, by making him odious out of his own mouth, they 
would be in a position to ask the Jury if they were ready to 
send a man to prison on the evidence of such an infamous 



454 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

informer ? This was what they hoped for as the strongest 
point of the defence. This same thing was what the prose- 
cution feared as the weakest point in the case of the 
people. 

Now, whether Mr. Peckham, when he addressed tlie 
Jury, really meant to put Andrew J. Garvey on the stand 
and subsequently changed his mind, or whether he made a 
pretense that he would do so, in order to send the defend- 
ant's counsel off on the wrong track and cause them to 
reserve all their ammunition for that event, is difficult to 
conjecture. But the facts are these : The prosecution 
called and examined several witnesses, and by their aid, 
damaging documentary evidence against Tweed was ad- 
mitted. Then John Keyser was examined, to supply some 
cormecting link in the chain. So was John Garvey, a 
brother of Andrew J. Garvey. This was all dull enough, 
and everybody, outside of the prosecuting officers, was 
waiting for the appearance of the great informer. Tweed's 
counsel especially were watching for him, as a tiger for its 
prey. When, lo and behold, Lyman Tremain, for the 
prosecution, arose and said, " The case of the people is 
closed." Consternation ! 

Mr. Graham was on his feet in an instant, the picture of 
dismay. At length he said " This is very surprising, your 
Honor. It was asserted by Mr, Peckham, in his opening 
speech, that the prosecution were going to call Garve}'." 

Judge Davis : " I have no power to force the prosecution 
to call Garvey, but if you want him, you are at liberty to 
call him." 

Mr. Graham : " I call hini \ I would as soon call Lucifer." 

Judge Davis : " That is a matter of choice." 

Then Mr. Graham requested the Court to allow him a 

little time under the circumstances, as Mr, Bartlett was 

absent for a few minutes. While waiting for Mr. Bartlett, 

his son, Willard Bartlett, who also had been absent, came 



COUNSEL FOR DEFENCE SURPRISED. 455 

111 and said his father wouhl be in Court presently. " When 
we went out," said young Bartlett, " we liad no idea that 
the prosecution would so soon hreak down." 

This provoked laughter, which young Bartlett did not 
ijuite comprehend, as he had been led to believe, from 
some remark made to him as he entered, that the prosecution 
had " thrown up the sponge." 

The defence, after Mr. Bartlett's appearance, opened in a 
lengthy speech by Ex-Judge Fullerton. Next day, the 
defence pnt only three witnesses on the stand, and were care- 
ful not to call Tweed himself. On the 18th of November, 
the summing np on both sides was concluded; Jndge Davis 
began his charge to the jury about six o'clock ; and the 
Jury retired. Crowds waited in Court to hear the verdict. 
Judge Davis retired to his chambers, and waited until three 
o'clock in the morning ; then, not hearing from the jury, 
he came into Court and adjourned Court until ten o'clock 
that morning, the Jury being locked up in the interval. 

Next morning, long before ten o'clock, the Court room 
was densely packed, and hundreds outside were unable to 
obtain entrance. Tweed, accompanied by his sons and 
numerous personal friends, came into the Court by the side 
entrance, a few minutes before ten o'clock. If he had any 
misgivings as to the result of the jury's deliberations, his 
appearance did not denote it. In fact, while not so bra- 
zenly confident as at the first trial, he acted with perfect 
composure. There was no friend of his who did not act as 
if Tweed was assured of another disagreement, or, perhaps, 
of an acquittal. While this confidence was at its height, 
inspiring jovialty all around, by some mysterious channel, 
word was conveyed to Tweed and his friends that every- 
thing was not all right— in fact, that there was great danger. 

Judge Davis came on the Bench five minutes past ten, 
and sent for the Jury. Tweed, disturbed by the information 
he had received, looked alarmed and was trembling in 



456 TTTIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITIC^. 

spite of his efforts. The Jurors filed in solemnly and took 
their seats. Their countenances betrayed not the shghtest 
indication as to their decision. Chief Clerk Sparks said : 
" Gentlemen of the Jury, have you agreed upon a verdict ? " 
The foreman rose and said they had not, but they desired 
further instructions with regard to one of the counts of the 
indictment. The Judge gave them the necessary instruc- 
tions, and the Jury again retired. During their absence, 
which was for only ten minutes, Tweed instinctively felt that 
his doom was sealed. He looked dismayed and wild, at the 
contemplation of his probable fate. The Jury filed in 
again, this time with their overcoats on and their hats in 
their hands, showing that they had taken a final departure 
from the Jury room, and that they had reached a verdict. 

In the intensity of their excitement, the people in the 
Court room rose in their seats, and scanned the faces of the 
Jurymen. When they were seated, Mr. Sparks said, once 
more : " Gentlemen, have you agreed upon a verdict ? " 

" We have," answered the foreman. 

" How say you," said the Clerk, " is William M. Tweed 
guilty or not ? 

"GUILTY!" 



LETTER XXXVIL 

Three Days of Intense Anxiety — Tweed's Desperate Ef- 
forts TO Obtain a Stay of Proceedings— Unabated 
Confidence OF His Enthusiastic Friends— A Strikingly 
Dramatic Scene in Court — An Awful Surprise — Ap- 
peal FOR Mercy to an Implacable Judge— Audience 
Awe-struck at the Sevj:rity of the Sentence — Tweed 
Fined and Sent to the Penitentiary for Twelve Years. 

My dear Dean : 

111 tlie preceding letter I liave described the scenes at the 
second trial of Tweed, resulting in a conviction l)j the Jury, 
on Wednesday, November 19, 1873. He was remanded, in 
the custody of the Sheriff, until the following Saturday 
morning (November 22), when he was to be brought before 
the Court again, for sentence. 

But another and far more dramatic scene in this great 
legal battle has yet to be pictured. 

By a large multitude of the people, who had lived so long 
under Tweed's reign and who had learned to regard his 
power as invincible, the verdict of tne Jury was not accepted 
as conclusive by any means. They believed that there were 
several Judges in the City and State who would save him 
from the consequences of that conviction. Indeed, so boldly 
was this claim made by his friends, that Assemblyman Regan, 
a close follower of Tweed, at the Delmonico bar-room, im- 
mediately after tlie verdict, boastingly and loudly delivered 
himself of the following defiance in the hearing of a number 
of persons : 

'' The verdict be d d ! William M. Tweed will never 

go to jail in this town. There will be a riot in New York 

45T 



438 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

before it will be allowed, and the Tombs would be torn down 
before they'd let him be locked up there ! " 

Regan said this with great earnestness, and, what is still 
more strange, he wa^ backed up by some of those present, 
who said '' That's so ! " Others, not so extreme, contented 
themselves with declaring that the verdict would certainly 
be set aside, or a stay of proceedings granted, before two 
days were over. This latter opinion was shared even by 
some of the newspapers next morning ; and this opinion 
gained strength during the three days which elapsed between 
the day of his conviction by the Jury and the day he was to 
be brought up for sentence. 

As yet, Tweed's hosts of friends, retainers, and almost 
numberless followers had shown no signs of deserting him ; 
for they had confidence in his wonderful resources and in 
his capacity for circumventing his enemies. Tweed's de- 
meanor confirmed their impression, for he kept up, not only 
his usual sprightly manner, but his jokes and good humor. 
His apparent indifierence to the verdict was generally attri- 
buted to bravado, but it is susceptible of a more reasonable 
construction. It would be entirely inconsistent with the 
prominent position he had hitherto occupied, and with his 
well-known love of popular applause, did he not keenly feel 
the degradation, if not the danger, of his position. Looking 
back at his entire career, it seems to me very certain that in 
the privacy of his own chamber, he must have given way 
to his overburdened sense of shame and humiliation. Taking 
this view of it, his apparent audacity of manner before the 
public had in it method and meaning. No man knew better 
than he the value of public opinion and popular support. 
He knew it was much easier to procure a stay of proceedings 
if the Judge who was asked for it believed that the populace 
of New York were clamorous in his favor, than if they were 
hostile to him or careless of his fate. Therefore, everywhere . 
throughout the City, during these three days, his forces 



BOSS TWEKl) IN SilKKlFF'S CUSTODY. 459 

were actively at work, creating puhlic opinion iii liis favor 
and luiii2^1iin<z; to scorn the suggestion that Tweed should 
ever go to jail. To be sure, he was in the custody of the 
Sheriff, whose Deputy, William 11. Shields, accompanied 
him everywhere and slept every night in his house ; but 
this was not much noticed, or, if noticed, was regarded as a 
mere formality and of no particular significance. There 
was scarcely a betting man in the city who was not ready 
to wa<Ter that Tweed would never see the inside of a iail as 
a prisoner. 

Hours and days went by, but no stay was yet in sight, 
althougli some of the ablest lawyers in the land were work- 
ing with might and main to procure one from Judges in 
every part of the State, until the dies irce approached — 
that fatal Saturday which banished all these illusions. 

On Saturday morning, November 22, 1873, Tweed, after 
a troubled night, for he had had no sleep, found himself 
like a stag at bay, and clinging to one last lingering ray of 
hope that the long-expected order staying the proceedings 
might be on hand when he reached the tribunal of Justice. 

At ten o'clock that morning Shields took out his watch 
and, approaching Tweed who sat conversing in low tones 
with his wife and daughter in the back parlor, said, respec;;- 
fully : '• Mr. Tweed, we will have to be off." " I am ready, 
Billy," said Tweed, rising. He then bade good-by to his 
daughters, who retired weeping. By his side still stood his 
wife who, with a woman's singular premonition of approach- 
ing woe, looked, in spite of her efforts, the picture of des- 
pair and agony. She trembled from head to foot with 
suppressed emotion ; seeing which, Tweed said to her, 
bravely and soothingly : '" I guess I will be back to niglit, 
Mary. It will come out all right yet." 

Shields and Tweed drove down to the Sheriff's office, 
where they were met by Sheriff Brennan, an old political 
associate of Tweed. As the Sheriff shook«Tweed's hand, 



460 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

he said, with unfeigned kindness: '* I hope you will bear 
up, Bill."' " Ah," responded Tweed, " I have tried to bear 
up, Matt ; I never thought it would come to this." Ac- 
companied by Sheriff Brennan and his officers, Tweed was 
quickly taken along the corridor into the Chambers of 
the Supreme Court, whence through a side door they 
entered the capacious Court room of the Oyer and Termi- 
ner. The room was already packed, almost to suffocation, 
by an anxious and expectant crowd, while the corridors, the 
stairways, and every passageway leading to the Court were 
filled with a surging multitude, from every station and 
calling of life, eager to obtain entrance or to hear some- 
thing of the portentous fate of the fallen chief. 

As Tweed took his seat every eye in the Court room was 
focussed upon him, and while he struggled to maintain a 
calm exterior, it was easy to notice the emotions which in- 
wardly disturbed him. He bore no longer an air of bravado. 
If he was not utterly cowed, he was at least subdued. His 
eye sought no one, either friend or foe, but as his chief 
counsel, John Graham, approached him, his countenance 
brightened for a moment. They greeted each other warmly 
and almost affectionately. One of Tweed's most striking 
attributes was his faculty for inspiring coufidence and friend- 
ship in those closely connected with him. To those who 
knew Graham's disposition, it was not difficult to understand 
how he could easily come under the spell of Tweed's 
magnetism. In his mental and moral qualities, no less than 
in his eccentric attire, John Graham was perhaps the most 
picturesque character that ever practised at the New York 
Bar. Below the medium height, his body was symmetrical 
and somewhat rotund. His face, clean shaven, except for 
a chin-whisker of light brown now sprinkled with grey, 
was full and florid, and denoted at once determination 
and goodness. He wore an auburn wig, which extended 
down almost to his broad shoulders. An immense Byronic 




(Redrawn from Frank Leslie's Weekly. By pennlsslon.) 

John Graham. 



l'K\ IMCTrUR OF A I'KOMINF.NT I.AWYRl^. (Cl 

Collar, worn extrciuelv low, set oil" his neck, wliicli was 
sliort, pluni)) and sliapely. A spotted necktie of hliK; and 
white gave to liis t'liecrv fac'o additional lustre. His Hhurt 
sack coat, of dark material, was carefully buttoned from top 
to bottom. A portion of his ])atcnt-lcatlier shoes was in- 
variably covered with mouse colored spats. This was tlie 
uni(pie make-up of a lawyer who, when he espoused the 
cause of a client, summoned and concentrated all the facul- 
ties of his soul in that client's behalf. So absolutely and 
unreservedly did he identify himself with the cause of his 
client, that no inducement of profit or gain could attract 
his attention to any other topic. Although his services 
were sought after, as the most distinguished criminal lawyer 
of his day, he may be said to have had only one case at a 
time, so intense was his zeal, and so wrapped up was his 
intellect, in the cause he had on hand. Neither to the right 
nor to the left would he turn, for fees or for favors, but he 
fought straight on, unremittingly and untiringly, for 
victory. 

While he was, perhaps, as able a criminal lawyer as any 
age has produced, John Graham was also a leading figure in 
the civil branches of his profession. Of literary tastes, and 
versed in ancient and modern classics, his range of informa- 
tion, on general subjects was varied and extensive. But his 
highest qualification was his natural gift of eloquence, 
to which nature also added a voice, strong, sonorous, and 
yet sweet, which he could modulate to suit the sentiments 
his utterances appealed to. When, in the course of an 
address or argument, a Judge or opposing counsel would 
interrupt him by advancing a proposition at variance with 
his reasoning and logic, it was then that he best exhibited 
the natural force of his eloquence. As the temporary dam- 
ming of a stream, which retards the flow of the M^ater in 
its natural course, only adds to its strength and velocity 
when the obstruction is removed, so it was with tlie 



462 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

eloquence of Graham, wliieh, when the interruption was 
overcome, rushed on with greater force and vohime than 
before. 

With most amiable manners and gentle disposition, out- 
side of the forensic arena, and sensitive and sympathetic 
almost to tenderness, he exhibited in legal combat, when 
aroused, an aggressiveness and impetuosity which few 
cared to encounter. While ordinarily courteous and 
respectful to the Court, he often permitted his zeal to 
approach the confines of contumacy. To arouse his anger 
was not only not difficult, but it required considerable 
ingenuity on the part of his opponent to avoid a per- 
sonal conflict with him. His peculiarities were well- 
known to Bench and Bar, and what would be deemed 
an intolerable affront in others was accepted in his case as 
one of the eccentricities of genius. There was not a 
particle of affectation in his composition and he never 
played a part for cheap effect. 

Some lawyers, as a mere subterfuge, become turbulent 
in Court and even insolent to the Judge, with a view of 
gaining notoriety or misleading the Jury. When Benjamin 
F. Butler, in his younger days, was practicing at the Boston 
Bar, it is said that accident disclosed a prepared speech 
which he intended to address to a Jury. It procet^ded 
argumentatively until a weak spot in his case was reached ; 
then, to remind him that he must befog the issue on this 
point, he had written: " Here, insult the Judge." 

Bolder even than this was the device of a young lawyer 
of a town in Ohio, who determined to secure clients by 
acquiring notoriety in a heroic manner. Going into Court, 
one day, on some minor motion, he had not proceeded far 
with his argument when he said : " Your Honor, I want to 
be committed for contempt of Court." " Well," said the 
Judge in astonishment, " are you in contempt of Court ? " 
" Yes sir," said the j'oung lawyer, " because I have a great 



A SOLEMN HOUR IN COURT. 463 

coiiteni])t for tliis Court." The old Jiulge, lookiiiii; at, him 
for a nioiiiont and divining his motive, said, calmly: 
*• Yoiin<!: man, T am sorry that I don't see my way to give 
you notoriety. 1 might remark, however, that your con- 
tempt for the Court is not half as great as the Court's con- 
tempt for you." 

Ihit the vehement outbursts of John Graham, which on 
many occasions made Judges uncomfortable, were not pre- 
meditated ; they were prompted by his eagerness to force 
his own views on the mind of the Court, and to resist those 
of his opponent at every step. In such conflicts he seemed 
to be at his best. He was quick in repartee, and could 
retort with asperity. I recall an instance when, in an 
important case, he was presenting an argument with great 
energy before Judge George G. Barnard, and in the course of 
it quoted a legal maxim of unusual length, in Latin ; where- 
upon, Judge Barnard, who was always meriy in those days, 
broke in with : " I think we may be able to get along with 
the English language, this morning, Mr. (iraham." 
Graham paused, looked at the Judge, and said, in low but 
distinct tones : " Well, your Honor, if in your earlier educa- 
tion you neglected the study of the ancient classics, that's 
none of my fault." 

But now, with the fate of Tweed on his hands, Mr. 
Graham was confronting the greatest ordeal of his life. 

At eleven o'clock Justice Davis entered, and slowly took 
his seat upon the Bench. He looked grave, as he surveyed 
the vast throng. His presence personified an ideal of Jus- 
tice. Of strong features, which his clean-shaven face 
more clearly defined, bold and stern, and flushed to a degree 
with the sense of the grave duty before him, which all 
men throughout the land, honest. and di.shonest, watched 
with intensity, it was plain that he realized the solemnity 
of the hour. The Court room became as still as the grave. 



464 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS, 

Looking at Mr. Graham, he said : " I am ready to hear 
you, Mr. Graham." 

Graham arose and addressed the Court, presenting an 
elaborate and intricate legal argument, the gist of which 
was that the acts of the Legislature creating the Boards of 
which Tweed was a member were unconstitutional, and 
that therefore there was no ground for the proceeding un- 
der which he stood convicted ; and he further argued that 
the Supreme Court had no jurisdiction of the offences 
under consideration, but only the Court of General Ses- 
sions. 

Justice Davis gave a somewhat lengthy opinion, and 
overruled all the points raised by Mr. Graham. 

Then came a most exciting scene, Lyman Tremain, 
the representative of the Attorney General of the State, 
arose on behalf of the People, to demand judgment. From 
the first, it was supposed by Tweed's lawyers that the 
maximum punishment was one year in the Penitentiary 
and a fine of $250. Indeed, it was hoped that the Judge 
might merely impose a fine, or give a sentence less than 
the extreme limit of one year. But their dreams were 
quickly dispelled, and a still deeper cup of sorrow awaited 
Tweed. Tremain, tall, portly and commanding, drew the 
Court's attention to the fact that the Jury had found the 
prisoner guilty on 204 counts, out of 220 in the indictment, 
and, as some of them must necessarily be grouped, from 
the nature of the accounts to which they related, the de- 
fendant stood liable to fine and imprisonment for only 102 
distinct offenses, the maxim-um punishment being one year 
and a fine of $250 for each offence This, it will be ob- 
served, would enable the Court to give Tweed 102 years' 
imprisonment, and an aggregate fine of $25,500. 

"But," said Mr. Tremain. in conclusion, "it is for the 
Court to say, whether, for humanity's sake, or for any 
other rsason, all the offenses should be treated as one." 



STRIKINGLY DUAMATIC SCENFl. 40.' 

]y[r. Graham, like a Hash, saw the trap. Iluiii.iiiity from 
Judge Davis towards Tweed ? Humanity of tlie tiger for 
its prey? The tenderness of the wolf to the laml) ? Gra- 
ham, his face sutfiised with excitement and auger, ])aused 
a moment to take breath. His attitude was sublime, al- 
though it was ferocious. 

'• This is startling," he said, at last. "■ It has come upon 
us with surprise — like the bursting of a volcano. Mr. 
Tremain cannot be serious. Was Mr. Peckham's opening 
speech to the Jury misleading to that body ? AVas it 
intended to lull the counsel for the defense into a false 
security ? If so, it was a disingenuousness not to be ex- 
pected from a Public Prosecutor. Will your Honor not 
give me — taken as I am by this awful surprise — some time 
to examine authorities ? I cannot answer opposing counsel 
on the spur of the moment." 

Judge Davis hesitated a little while ; then said, " We 
shall take a recess until half past one." 

In these few minutes, Tweed's face assumed a deathly 
pallor, and he looked as if his heart sank within him. lie 
felt that Judge Davis had him in a net and would consign 
him to prison for many years. He held his head in his 
hands to avoid the gaze of the people. He would have ex- 
cited the pity of his bitterest enemy. 

The Court reassembled at the hour named, and Graham 
whose eyes were red from the tears he had shed, made a 
forcible and convincing argument, that the Court could not 
impose a cumulative sentence; that the maximum punish- 
ment was only one year ; and cited numerous authorities to 
sustain his position. He further stated that Mr. Peckham, 
one of the counsel for the people, had conceded at the 
opening that the maximum punishment was one year, and 
the Jury, when bringing in the verdict, must have believed 
this, or they would have brought in a different form of 
verdict. 



466 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

" Can it be credited," he urged, " that the Jury wilfully 
intended, under their oaths, to give any Judge on earth the 
preposterous authority to impose a sentence of one hundred 
and two years' imprisonment on a defendant? Is it not 
plainly conclusive that they believed one year to be the 
extreme limit of punishment under one indictment ? Sup- 
pose one indictment contained a thousand counts, under the 
construction here contended for, a verdict of a Jury might 
authorize a Judge to impose a sentence of one thousand 
years' imprisonment! Laws are not made so loosely as 
tliis. Laws are founded on common sense, and do not run 
against reason and conscience." 

But from the manner of Judge Davis it was evident not 
only to Graham himself, but to everyone in the Court- 
room, that Graham's eloquence and logic were falling on 
barren soil. 

At length Graham suddenly stopped, and looking at the 
Judge steadfastly, said : 

"If this must pass, and I am not upheld in my premises, then I 
must appeal to the Court for consideration. I can say from my heart 
that this day is the most painful, the most wretched, of my life. I 
have lived many years; I have long practiced in this Court; but never 
have I been so moved within myself as at the shape this matter has 
taken. The Court sitting here (extending both hands appealingly to 
the Judge), in spite of judicial feelings, is also swayed by human im- 
pulses. The heart a man has makes him a man, and those traits which 
make woman the most lovely creature of God are those which give her 
tenderness and mercy as her greatest gifts. It cannot detract from 
the sterner stuff of which man is made to be merciful. One of the 
most sublime invocations that ever stirred the human heart, are the 
words of the Universal Prayer : 

' Teach me to feel another's woe, 

To hide the fault I see; 
That mercy I to others show, 

That mercy show to me.' 

" Your honor, we are taught, from the time we enter this world, to 
ask for mercy; and those prayers which we put up in our own behalf 
must teach us to render deeds of mercy to " 



TWEED HIDES HIS FACE AND AVEEPS. -icr 

Mr. Graham stopped siuUlenly, overcome by emotion, 
sank into a chair, and bending forward over a table, with 
his head between his hands, sobbed convulsively. It was 
an awful moment. Tweed hid his face in his liands 
and wept. There was no man in the Court room that was 
not visibly moved, but one — Judge Davis on the Bench. 

Several seconds passed before Tremain arose. He was 
pale and nervous, and his lips quivered. lie spoke coldly, 
or tried to, of the points of law ; but, after a little, aban- 
doned this and, turning towards Graham, said : 

" Far be it from me to ignore those inuerinost reasons which must 
sway us in a case like this. I cannot but feel, and I am sure my asso- 
ciates feel with me — indeed, all must feel — how terrible is the position 
of this man, who has been so high and who has fallen so low. He is 
now drinking the bitter waters of humiliation. The spell is broken. 
God knows we do not feel glad at our position here to-day. Would it 
were otiierwise! " Turning to the .Tudge, he continued: "The law 
has placed in your hands the responsibility of the matter. The case is 
one of international interest and attracts the attention of the whole 
world. We now leave to you the question of what shall be meted out 
to the prisoner as an impartial and just penalty." 

As Lyman Tremain sat down, a low, indistinct murmur 
of approval could be faintly heard throughout the Court 
room. Graham still had his head buried between his arms, 
which rested on the table. Tweed, with bowed head, kept 
his face between his hands. The stillness was oppressive. 
It was broken by Judge Davis, who said, impressively : 

" If any one imagines it is grateful to me to have to do my duty in 
this case, he is mistaken. I feel it is one of my duties which I would 
have gladly seen fall upon other shoulders. I cannot shrink from it, 
while I harbor no thought of harshness or severity. I have the power 
to temper my action with mercy. I have not followed, in what I deem 
my duty, any of the suggestions inimical to the defendant. But I will 
execute the law by just and adequate punishment. It is deeply to be 
regretted that the Legislature has not fixed the penalty for the various 
crimes of public officers who, clothed with trust, rob the public, and 
who suffer other men to take money out of the public treasury. We 
can only give wliat I consider a petty penalty of one year in jail, and 
$250 line for each of these offenses, notwithstanding that the defendant 



43S THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

took more than one million dollars of the public moneys. If the Jury, 
for instance, had found that the prisoner committed but one offense, 
how farcical would be the judgment of one year's imprisonment for the 
bold and audacious robbery of one million dollars ! But the Court has 
here larger powers, commensurate with a due regard fo:- the interests 
of the public." 

The Judge ceased speaking and looked at Sparks, the 
Chief Clerk of the Court, who solemnly arose and said: 
" Prisoner at the bar, what have you to say now why sen- 
tence should not be pronounced upon you ? " 

Tweed stirred not ; but Graham, after a short pause, in a 
low voice said : " He has spoken through his counsel." 

Sparks then announced, " The prisoner will now rise 
and receive the sentence of the Court." 

Amidst breathless silence, Tweed slowly arose and placed 
his right hand on the back of a chair for support. His 
strong face quivered as he looked straight at the Judge. 
The Judge looked straight at him, and in deep, almost 
guttural, tones, began : 

"William M. Tweed, you stand convicted by the verdict of an intel- 
ligent and honest Jury of a large number of particular crimes charged 
against you in this indictment. That verdict, in the opinion of the 
Court, could not have been otherwise without a violation of the o.iths 
which the Jury had taken, and an utter disregard of the obligaiious 
under which they rested, to speak the truth, and the truth only, by 
their verdict. The proof in this case, when laid before the Jury at the 
close of the People's case, was simply a mathematical demonstration of 
your guilt. Holding high public office, honored and respected by large 
classes of the community in which you lived, and, 1 have no doubt, be- 
loved by your associates, you, with all these trusts devolved upon you. 
with all the opportunity you had, by the faithful discharge of your 
duty, to win the honor and respect of the whole community, you saw 
fit to pervert the powers with which you were clothed in a manner 
more infamous, more outrageous, than any instance of like character 
which the history of the civilized world contains. Instead of protecting 
the public, you plundered it; instead of standing guard where the law 
put you, over the treasury of the County, you threw it open, not 
merely to your own rapacity, but to the avarice of your associates, 
under circumstances where it is transparent that you were engaged in 
a concerted conspiracy to plunder the treasury of this County, and 



SEVERE SENTENCE OF THK JIDCE 40!) 

enricli your associates iu criiiic Jiiul yourself. Tlie evidence on that 
subject can leave no manner of doubt. Connnencing with the entry 
on your duties, on the fifth day of May, 1870, iu the orgiuiizalion of 
the Board of Audit, (after the pas-sage of the resolution dellning the 
mode in which the proof shovdd be furnished to your IJoard and action 
should be had t!icreia,)on the very next day your career of plunder 
commenced. On the sixth day of IVIay, and from that day forward 
consecutively till the whole I'JO accounts had been audited, certified 
warrants issued, and the money paid, the evidence is conclusive that 
the whole proceeding was to carry out a concerted plan to enrich your- 
self and those who were associated with you. 

" If there was no other circumstance in the case than that, it would, 
in my judgment, be conclusively established by the fact that on each 
of these several claims, as they were passed upon and ultimately paid, 
your share of the plunder was regularly fixed and presented at twenty- 
four per cent., the share of your associates seeming to have been 
measured bv a .somewdiat .similar standard. It is impossible to believe 
than on the distribution of 190 cases of money received upon these 
warrants twenty-four per cent, should have always been allotted to 
you, had it not been understood in advance, by prearrangement, that 
that sum should be your fixed proportion of the moneys of which this 
County was to be plundered. When we see a machine, the creation of 
some inventive genius, turning out at each revolution a fixed amount 
of some manufacture or product, we argue from that result, that mind, 
thought, reflection, prevision, had something to do with the produc- 
tion, in that form, of the consequences we have before U3 of the action 
of that machine; and the machinery through which you operated pro- 
duced a like result, and in a form iu which it was impossible not to see 
behind it a like concerted conspiracy, by which you were benefited in 
common with the others who shared that plunder, and for it consum- 
mated that grave and awful crime. 

" It is in vain to suggest that your trial and conviction have been the 
resu't of any partisan feelings — that this is, after all, a struggle (as one 
of the proposed Jurors who was called here said) between the Ins and the 
Outs? Xo ; the whole contest has been a struggle between Honesty and 
Fraud, between Virtue and Crime. While it is true that one great and 
powerful leading paper in this City, belonging to a particular party, 
was the firs' to drag to light and hold up to the public eye these infa- 
mous frauds, yet it is equally true that prominent, able, honorable men 
of all parties united at once to investigate and develop their true char- 
acter. O'Conor, an eminent Democrat, who holds the foremost rank in 
his profession, and who stands without a .stain upon a character as pure 
and noble as any man's in this great City, immediately from his semi- 



470 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

retirement came and aided in the rescue of this City from its great cor- 
ruption ; and Tilden, who stood as a leading man at the head of the 
Democratic Central Committee of this State, devoted weeks and months 
of toil in ferreting out these crimes, in ascertaining from the bank 
accounts what had been done, till he was able to lay before us, the 
other day, on the trial, the result, crystalline in its simplicity, and so 
clear that no man could fail to read its meaning. I need not refer to 
other prominent men of your own party who took an active part in 
these proceedings that ultimately led to your conviction— I mean the 
development of proof of these great frauds. It would be wrong and 
unjust to them to entertain for one moment the idea that your con- 
viction has been the result of persecution at the hands of anybody— 
any person or any party. It has been the result of the ascertainment 
and the production of evidence so clear and plain that never, either 
in my experience or in my reading, have I seen a case where the 
evidence was so utterly overwhelming, and where it was so impos- 
sible for the Jury, if they ' say the truth,' to avoid a conviction. Dur- 
ing the whole of it you remained, until your conviction, as calm and 
serene as though supported by innocence, while it was overwhelmingly 
apparent that all your serenity was only audacity, and confidence in 
the omnipotence of corruption, rather than reliance upon your integ- 
rity or truth. The duty of the Court is to pronounce upon you a sen- 
tence now that may be in some degree adequate to your crime." 

Judge Davis then sentenced the prisoner to the Peniten- 
tiary for twelve years and to pay fines aggregating $12,500. 

The audience was awe-struck, Not a person moved, not 
a word was uttered. It was as though something appalling 
had occurred, that for the moment overpowered their senses 
and held them spellbound. 

At length the Sheriff's officers arose, and then the pris- 
oner. They walked towards the side-door through which 
they had entered. This broke the culmination of the op- 
pressive silence, and the vast throng began to move towards 
the main exit. The prisoner was kept in the Supreme 
Court Chambers for some time to avoid the crowd. His 
brother and son were by his side, as they had been all day. 

In the meantime, Judge Davis called order in Court, and 
announced that he desired the attention of the several 
counsel for the prisoner that were present. There were 



A JUDICIAL BOMBSHELL. 471 

seven of them within hearing, and they instantly stood up 
and moved toward the Bench. With impressive cahnness 
and deliberation, Judge Davis addressed them, saying : 

" At the begiuniag of this trial, I notified the counsel for the defence 
that I should take some action \ipou a certain paper which was handed 
me before the case opened. I intended then, and I intend now, tliat 
that document shall receive the notice that it de-serves. 

I now fix the hour of ten o'clock on Monday morning next when 
counsel for the defence must be present ; at whicli time 1 shall proceed 
to do what I deem proper in the matter, and take such action as your 
pMK-eeding demands. You (and all of you signed the paper) are direct- 
ed to attend on Monday morning." 

The lawyers were thunderstruck ; they looked at the 
Judge, then at each other, in astonishment; but they were 
much more astonished on Monday morning. 



LETTER XXXVIII. 

Unique Legal Proceedings of Surpassing Interest-Tweed's 
Counsel Summoned to the Bar for Contempt-Their 
Protest in behalf op their Client Sternly Eebuked- 
JuDiciAL Dignity Vindicated by an Upright Judge- 
Three Leading Lawyers Fined Two Hundred and Fifty 
Dollars Each-The Real Culprits Exonerated and 
Complimented. 

My dear Dean : 

Monday morning, November 25, 1873, was a memorable 
day in the history of the New York Bar; for on that day 
ei^^ht of the leading lawyers of this City were smPuioned 
before the tribunal of Justice, by the command of an 
angered Judge, to receive castigation for oliendmg J^gainst 
the dignit;y of the Bench. 

Who constituted the distinguished coterie thus chf^-ged i 
One of the delinquents was David Dudley Field, the old, 
astute lawyer, the compiler of criminal codes and author ot 
able dissertations upon the law, who for nearly half a 
century had been going through all the mazes of civil and 
criminal practice. Another was John E. Burrill, austere, 
imperious and supercilious, whose practice in corporatiop 
and commercial law netted $75,000 a year. Then ther-. 
was John Graham, one of the greatest criminal lawyers ,n 
America, whose peculiarities and qualifications I have de- 
scribed in a preceding letter. There was also William 
Fullerton, a former Judge, whose powers as a forensic 
advocate could hardly be surpassed; William O. Bartlett, 
of proud bearing and aggressive proclivities, whose elo- 
quence aimed to touch the stars; Elihu Root, a rising young 
lawyer, keen and far-seeing, who has since advanced almost 

473 



COUNSKI. Ti:YlN(i TO lUiACK TIIEMSELVKS. 



473 



to the foroino..t rank of hi. profession; an.l \\ iHanl 
llartlett, who a few years later was elevated to the Supreme 
Court ]3ench, and who still occupies that hi-h station. I he 
Jud-e before whom they were cited had been elected the 
precedinc>- Fall, on the wave of popular indignation beneatli 
which the Tammany Hall candidates were submerged 

David Dudley Field had been called to Europe. John 
E Burrill having some knowledge of the stern character 
of Judge Davis, sent him a personal, written plea.. in ad- 
vance and without consulting his associates, setting forth 
that he had retired from the Tweed case months before, 
and was not aware that the objectionable paper, signed in the 
preceding month of June, was to be presented to Judge 
Davis at the November term of the Court ; and that he there- 
fore repudiated the document, although he acknowledged 
that he had si-ned it. Thus the ranks of the accused lawyers 
were broken,^one of them being absent in Europe, and an- 
other frightened into a crawfish attitude. Of the rest, Jo Im 
Graham advised that a defiant stand be taken; that the 
Bar had its rights and duties as well as the Bench ; that it 
was an impropriety on the part of Judge Davis to try the 
case the second time, considering what had transpired at 
the first trial, where the Judge was unable to conceal his 
hostile feelings-more especially as there were six other 
Supreme Court Judges in the City, and thirty-five in the 
State, before any one of whom the defendant's counsel 
were willing to have the case tried ; that the greatest crim- 
inal monster on earth should have a fair trial, not merely 
technically, but substantially and broadly ; and that when 
the real facts were disclosed, their action would not only 
be sustained in the higher Courts, but would meet with the 
approval of the public. 

From what transpired after Mr. Field's return from 
Europe, to which I shall refer hereafter, it is certain that 
had he been at the conference which was held on the bun- 



474 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

day night before the proceedings, he would have coincided 
with Mr. Graham's views, and some positive action of 
resistance to the threatened punishment by Judge Davis 
would have been probably determined upon. As it was, 
however, Graham could not obtain from his associates any 
support in his proposed attitude. Indeed, on the contrary, 
it was suggested that a most ample apology be made, in the 
hope that if Judge Davis did not wholly relent, he would at 
the worst only impose a fine upon them ; while, on the other 
hand, if Mr. Graham's programme were adopted. Judge Davis 
might^be driven to commit them to the County jail for thirty 
days for contempt of Court, which he had the power to 
do. If he merely imposed a fine, they could save them- 
selves from going to jail by paying it, which of course 
they would do, no matter what it was. Graham was very 
determined in his opposition to this pacific method. Even 
if Judge Davis merely imposed a fine, the order would be 
that they stood committed until it was paid ; and Graham 
contended that it was their duty to themselves, as men and 
members of the Bar, not to pay a fine which they believed 
to be unjust ; that, let the Judge's tyranny take its worst 
form, they could only be imprisoned for a short time ; that 
they could sue out a Writ of Habeas Corpus before other 
Judges, and perhaps obtain the right to give bail, pending 
the decision of the question before the higher courts. 
Young Bartlett was in great distress lest this programme 
should be adopted. He thought that to have his father 
and himself imprisoned at the same time, for the same 
offense, and in the same jail, was altogether too much mar- 
tyrdom for one family ; and he pleaded that so dreadful an 
alternative as going to jail should be avoided. 

"Well, young man," said Graham; "bigger men than we 
have consented to go to jail to maintain independence, and 
for great causes, who were forever after honored for their 
courage." 



CONSENTING TO A WRITTEN DISC^AUrKK. irr) 

''Oh," replied the }'ouii<; man, -1 don't like jails; T 
would rather sleep home. It may be all right to suffer for 
a great cause, but I would rather suffer for it outside of 

jail." 

" Why,'' said Mr. Graham, much amu!?ed at the fright 
which had overtaken his young associate, " don't you know- 
that the great and good Horace Greeley was, only a few 
years ago, imprisoned in the City of London, and it 
troubled him so little that he wrote a humorous account of 
it. In one place he described the massive high stone walls, 
one outside the other, with spikes on top ; and then the 
old i^hilosopher concluded by saying that he didn't think 
he ever slept in such a safe place in his life ? And so," 
said Graham, laying his hand on the young man's shoulder, 
assuringly, "we will be safe enough in Ludlow street jail 
for the few days we will spend there." 

It was no fear of the jail not being safe that disturbed 
young Bartlett, for Ludlow street jail never had any 
record of people breaking into it, although it had quite a 
record of people breaking out of it ; but he felt that the 
age of martyrdom had passed away, and that there was no 
use in trying to revive it. 

Mr. Graham, standing alone, had to accede to the will of 
the majority, and he joined in a written disclaimer of any 
intent to offend the Judge, which was as near an apology 
for their course as was consistent with their independence 
as lawyers and as men. Mr. Fallerton was selected to do 
whatever talking might be necessary. 

The Court room was densely crowded, not altogether by 
the people who had attended the Tweed trial, but by mem 
bers of the Bar, and men prominent in every station of life. 
The Bar was deeply interested, for, although the exact 
nature of the paper referred to was then generally un- 
known, the spectacle of arraigning a body of lawyers for 
discipline and punishment, especially lawyers of high 



4r6 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

distinction and character, was so imusual and extraordinary, 
that the whole legal fraternity of New York was agitated, 
and to a degree excited. 

Judge Davis came on the Bench at ten o'clock sharp, 
looking calm but severe. He began : 

" In the matter to which I called the attention of counsel 
in the case of the People against Wni. M. Tweed, touching 
the presentation of the paper subscribed by David Dudley 
Field, John Graham, William Fullerton, W. O. Bartlett, 
J. E. Burrill, Elihu Root, William Bartlett, and William 
Eggleston, the Court is ready to hear any suggestions that 
counsel who presented this paper may wish to make as to 
the proper action to be taken on the paper by the Court." 

Mr. Fullerton : " The pleasure of your Honor with refer- 
ence to the order of proceeding ? ' ' 

Judge Davis: "I will adopt any order counsel seem to 
think will best present their views in relation to tlie paper 
and the action of the Court thereon." 

Mr. Fullerton : " Myself and associates are not prepared 
for that this morning." 

Judge Davis : " You are not prepared ? " 

Mr. Fullerton: "No sir; we do not yet know what part 
of the paper is objectionable." 

Judge Davis : " The Court informs you the whole paper 
is objectionable, and that the supposed objects and purposes 
of the paper are objectionable." 

Mr. Fullerton : " If the proceeding is in the nature of 
contempt, it should take some form or shape so that we 
could give some definite answer." 

Judge Davis : " I have no disposition to take any step to 
preclude counsel from making explanation, or from being 
heard fully on any legitimate question arising from the 
paper itself, or from the nature of the proceedings touching 
it. A statement will be made in order that they may 
know the view the Court takes of the paper itself." 



THE JUDGE DEFINES HIS I'OSITION. 477 

Mr. Fiillerton : ''Ilavin^d: Jointly disclaiiued any iiiteii- 
tioii to disrespect your Honor, we can do nothing until we 
know your Honor's views." 

Jud<j;e Davis: " I have your disclaimer. The intent of 
the paper, the ohject of the paper, was not, I believe— per- 
haps it is vanity in me to believe so nmcli— to cast any 
personal disrespect upon myself, but to interpose something 
in the course of Justice, which the law cannot tolerate and 
which tlio Court cannot overlook. It is because of its effect 
upon the administration of Justice, and of its evil example, 
in my judgment, and of its influence upon Courts and 
upon the Bar itself as a precedent, that I feel bound to 
take notice of it. If the disclaimer was a personal matter 
I should take no further steps." 

Mr. Fullerton : " "We disclaim any desire to show disre- 
spect or to bring disrespect on the administration of Justice. 
We disclosed our views fairly and honestly iu the communi- 
cation your Honor received this morning. The language 
was meant to include the Court, and we do not hesitate to 
make its terms more broad and comprelftnsive." 

Judge Davis : " I understand this disclaimer simply to 
declare that the counsel had no intent to show any disre- 
spect toward me. The language is : 'In drawing up and 
presenting that paper, nothing was further from our inten- 
tion than to show any disrespect towards you,' and it then 
proceeds 'to say that the paper was intended for my own 
' sole consideration,' by which you meant to be understood 
that it was designed to be considered by me individually 
and not as a Court ? " 

Mr. Fullerton: "That was the object. It was never 
intended for the public. It was a private communication 
and the letter was couched in that language." 

Judge Davis, after a moment's pause, proceeded to re- 
view the conduct of counsel^ iu the following scathing lan- 
guage : 



478 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

" I will state to counsel my views on the paper in question, and of 
the purpose it had in view, at the time of preparation, and what I sup- 
pose to be correct history. I have no personal feeling to gratify, no 
political animosity to avenge, and I have no unfriendly feeling to any 
member of the Bar of New York. This paper was prepared in June 
last, when defendant's counsel moved to postpone the trial. The first 
signer, David Dudley Field, is in Europe. John E. Burrill writes a 
letter, stating his withdrawal from the case and his want of knowledge 
that it was to be presented at this time, and that he was not consulted 
about it. I assume, therefore, that the paper was prepared prior to the 
sitting of the Court, or to that period at which Mr. Tweed's trial was 
intended to be moved by the prosecution. The first day the Court met, 
in June last, the case was postponed on account of ill-health of one of 
the Jurors. The people's counsel opposed this strenuously^ The Court 
adjourned the case, on motion of defendant's counsel, until October, 
because the Summer season was fatal to health. Now the counsel 
come to Court with this same paper. They were willing then to get an 
advantage by making a motion to a disqualified Court. If the motion 
were not granted to postpone at that time, this paper would have been 
presented. On Wednesday before election, counsel came to Court and 
made a motion to postpone until after election, armed again with this 
paper, if it were not granted, and willing to take chances of getting a 
fair decision from the Court whom they, over their signatures, declared 
disqualified to sit. On the day after election the case was moved for 
trial. Mr. FuUerton was not in Court, and after delaying the Court for 
thirty minutes, he came in, and then, after consultation between counsel, 
this paper was handed for the first time to the Court. Counsel knows 
what took place at that time. 

First: The objection to the paper lies in the apparent object, which 
is, I am bound to suppose until something contrary appears, that the 
presentation of the document, signed by distinguished and numerous 
counsel, eight signatures in all, would have the effect, from this state- 
ment, to so intimidate the Judge who was to try the case that he would 
not perform the duty which the law devolved upon him, but would 
leave the Bench for some other Judge. 

Secondly: The intent of this paper was that it would be recorded and 
published by the press, that the Judge was partial, had expressed his 
hostility to the person on trial, and that his opinions were contrary to 
the decisions of other Judges, and was, on account of prejudice, not a 
proper Judge to sit in the case, and that this statement, laid before the 
public, would have a serious influence on those in the Jury box, if the 
.Judge persisted, notwithstanding the paper, in trying the case. 

Jhirdly: It was an attempt to challenge off the Bench a Judge whose 



APOLOOY OF COUNSEL ANALYSED. 4W 

duly placed him tlu re f(ir the occasion as the presiding officer of the 
Court, —an innovation of the law and the practice that had previously 
existed, and not upon tenable grounds in law. The paper contained ob- 
jectionable matter, impugning the past and present position of the Pre- 
siding Judge. The Judge expressed no opinion, which it states he did; 
and although the Judge charged the Jury so that it was probably im- 
possible for them not to see what his opinion really was, yet no expres- 
sion of the opinion itself can be found ; and the Judge expressly warned 
the Jury that his opinion must not govern their action at all. The 
language of the Court in the charge was clear. The Court said, speak- 
ing of propositions of defense : ' You are the judge of the facts and 
must .say what the evidence proves or disproves. Although you must 
be able to see that I have but one opinion of this transaction myself, in- 
dividually, and should be ashamed not to have an opinion, yet you 
must not be goveined by that.' It must have been plain to see from 
the drift of the charge what was the opinion of the Court, and they 
were guarded against it so far as this rule went — that they were the 
sole judges of the fact. This paper stated that the Court declined to 
charge the Jury not to be influenced by the expression of his opinion. 
Mr. Field did ask the Court to charge, but quite different from that, 
lie asked the Court at the close of the charge, ' In respect to ovir first 
request to charge, we understand you to charge this Jury that they are 
to find according to the evidence upon which they are to act themselves, 
without any influence from the Court whatever ; and we ask you to so 
charge.' The Court responded 'I cannot charge otherwise than 1 have 
charged. They are the sole judges of the facts" — a very different thing 
from a charge that they were not to be influenced by the expression of 
an opinion, if any such had been expressed. Such a charge would be 
eminently improper, for the Jury are never to act in a case without the 
Court, but they are bound to take the law from the Court, and are al- 
ways entitled, in applying evidence to the law, to act on the sugges- 
tions of the Court, whose duty it is to aid them. 

"But Mr. Field interpolated an entirely new principle — to act with- 
out any influence from the Court whatever. It was untrue that the 
Court declined to charge the Jury not to be influenced by such an ex- 
pression of opinion. A statement of that kind under such circum- 
stances must have been made with a motive. The paper proceeds to 
say that a trial by Jury influenced, as it necessarily would be, by an 
opinion of the Justice, formed before such trial, would be had under 
bias and prejudice and not by an impartial tribunal, such as the Consti- 
tution .secures to defendant. 

'■ The second objection made to the Court was that ' before the recent 
act of the Legislature of this State, providing that challenges to the 



4^0 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

favor should be tried by the Court, any person who had assumed a 
position in reference to this defendant, such as it was said this Justice 
had assumed, would be disqualified to act as a trier.' I deem that 
sentence extremely objectionable. The counsel displaced the Judge as 
trier, on the statement that he assumed a position towards the defendant 
which would disqualify any person, under tha law, from sitting in the 
case as a trier ; which was tantamount to saying that he had taken 
some hostile, personal grounds against the defendant, as to this case, 
which excluded him. 

" It is also objectionable to say that he assumed such a position in 
reference to the case, because I don't think it can be truthfully said 
that the Judge presiding upon the first trial assumed any position 
except that which, in his judgment, was a simple duty to the public 
under the extraordinary evidence of the case. The paper said he 
assumed a position in the case toward the defendant which disqualified 
him from sitting in the case as a trier. This carries with it the sting, in 
substance, that he had assumed a position in the case, toward defendant, 
which would disqualify him from sitting, if he were called upon as a 
member of the Bar, as a trier of the jurors. How counsel could justify 
themselves in making such assertions I cannot see. Disqualified as a 
trier then, now he must be disqualified as a Judge. No further com- 
ment to make. 

" FoinHhly : ' Most of the important questions of law which will be 
involved upon the trial have already been decided adversely, by the 
Justice, to the defendant, and on some important points, rulings were 
in opposition to the previous decisions of other Judges. Although 
there is no positive law against the Judge sitting on the trial, under the 
circumstances, it would be a violation of the spirit of the Constitution, 
which prohibits any Judge sitting in review of his own decisions.' I 
have no comment to make on the logic of this proposition, but it is an 
extraordinary position to take, to exclude a Judge from the Bench on 
the ground that he has opinions of his own on law questions. If he 
does not know enough law to have opinions on law subjects, he cer- 
tainly ought to be excluded a priori when trial comes on. 

" Then counsel conclude by saying that they objected to the Judge who 
expressed an opinion on the law, from sitting in the case. The object 
is more apparent from the fact that, in many States where Juries are 
judges of law as well as of fact, he would be absolutely disqualified as 
a Juror. This last proposition seems to have no motive but to interfere 
with the administration of justice in one of two modes. Had counsel 
refused to proceed before signing that paper, one might perhaps con- 
clude that upon almost any Judge the effect would be to make it a duty 
so apparent to proceed with the case that he could not shrink from it 



RELATIONS OF BAR AND BENCH. 481 

without discredit to himself. 1 felt when I read that paper, notwith- 
standiujj; that I miule strenuous clTorts to not sit in this case, and tried 
to procure an eminent Judge from the country to t;ike my place — I 
felt, under no circumstance could I entertain for a moment the idea of 
retirinjr, after such a document was laid before me. I could not but 
feel, as I feel to-day, that in the administration of justice, counsel, who 
are officers of the law, declared by statute to be judicial oflicers and 
classified witli the Judiciary, had forgotten their ol)ligations, not merely 
to the Courts, but to the maintenance of law and justice in the country 
in which they live, when they sat down deliberately and prepared such 
a document to be put before a Judge about to try a case, for the pur- 
pose' of either intimidating him from the Bench, or surrounding him 
with such embarrassment, and placing him in such a position as would 
render every decision and act he chose to perform, prejudicial against 
him, in the minds of the counsel who sat before him, so that he could 
not occupy a position of entire independence, as relates to the parties, 
in this particular case ; and in addition, to affect the public mind and 
also the jury empaneled, by making them believe, in advance, that they 
were coming before a Judge who was admittedly partial, prejudiced 
and not to be respected. 

"These are views I want counsel to consider; these are views which, 
unless explanations are made, I feel by the sense of duty I owe to the 
administration of justice, that I am bound in some manner to enforce, 
in order to show members of the Bar, as well as the whole community, 
that the Courts are not to be approached or intimidated. If cour:sel 
wishes further time in respect to these matters, the Court will grant it. 
I do not want to act hastily, but only as the behests of justice require." 

Mr. FuUerton : " The counsel desire to make a more 
formal disclaimer of intents wliicli your Honor ascribed to 
them, and tliey want time, when they will be ready to 
make a proper answer. I wotild ask that the matter stand 
over for a few days." 

The matter was adjourned until Saturday, November 29, 
1873. 

After the Court adjourned, and during the intervening 
days from Monday until Saturday, the severe lecture b y 
Judge Davis was discussed freely by lawyers and others. 
It was universally admitted that Judge Davis was entirely 
right in upholding the dignity of tlie Cburt, and his disser- 
tation on the relations of Bar and Bench was pronounced a 



482 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

masterpiece, which, while containing scathing rebukes, was 
delivered with a judicial calmness and impressive dignity 
that elicited the highest commendations. 

William M. Evarts, the distinguished lawyer and states- 
man, accompanied by Mr. Rothery, an eminent English 
barrister, attracted by the novelty, if not the gravity, of the 
occasion, sat at counsel's table during the proceedings. 
Like Mr. Evarts, Mr. Rothery was evidently impressed 
with the manner arid utterances of Judge Davis, and had 
an excellent opportunity of witnessing a remarkable scene, 
in which the dignity of an American Judge was as impres- 
sive as if he were invested with the silk gown, ermine and 
big wig, which are supposed to contribute so largely to the 
dignity of the Judicial authority in England. 

On the following Saturday, Nov. 29, the Court was 
again crowded to hear the formal defence of the lawyers 
and the decision of Judge Davis. There was silence, deep 
as if a death sentence was to ])e pronounced, when Judge 
Davis took his seat upon the Bench. The offending coun- 
sel presented an elaborate defence, answering seriatim the 
accusations against them. It was read by Mr. Eullerton. 
It was an able document, ingeniously steering between 
Scylla and Charybdis — maintaining, by delicate shading, 
that they were right in their course, and yet showing, by 
still more delicate shading, that neither the dignity of the 
Judge nor the administration of Justice was assailed. It 
insisted that the motives imputed by the Court were 
unfounded, and such as they, as honorable counsel, could 
not have entertained. They recalled that, in presenting 
the paper to Judge Davis, they were contending profess- 
ionally against a current prejudice as to their client, and 
that the protest was presented in a delicate way. It 
was presented when first the occasion for its use arose, and 
would have been premature for them to have presented 
the paper before it appeared that the Judge would sit. 
They drew attention to the circumstance that the with- 



COUNSEL FINED |350 EACH. 483 

drawal of Mr. Burrill from the case was communicated to 
the Judge before lie eulii^htened his associates on that sul)- 
ject ; they dischiimed any iutent, such as supposed by the 
Judge, to intimidate or drive him from the Bench, nor 
could they understand how the Judge could suppote the 
paper was for publication, when he had been informed that 
it had never been given to the public. They submitted 
that, where their action was consistent with high motives 
and strict professional conduct, other motives should not 
be imputed. Then they proceeded to discuss remarks of 
the Judge on the subject of the communication, and said 
that while their respect for the Court prevented them from 
entering into a controversy with it as to the falsity of cer- 
tain statements in the paper, they must direct the attention 
of the Court to the stenographic report, which had been 
made for them and on wliich they relied. 

Judge Davis, here interrupting, said that, in quoting, he 
had omitted sentences which qualified the sentences quoted. 

Mr. Fullerton replied that they had not quoted more 
than seemed necessary to establish the right of counsel to 
believe their statement to be true, and that it could not be 
declared to be untrue. 

The answer then drew the attention of the Judge to the 
record that Mr. Field asked to charge the Jury to find 
according to the evidence, upon their oaths, without any 
influence from the Court whatever. This the Court de- 
clined to do. Attached to the answer was an affidavit, 
from all the counsel present, disclaiming any intent to 
commit contempt. In reply, Judge Davis disclaimed 
being governed by personal motives, and said if tlie 
paper had been given privately, out of Court, he would 
have paid no attention to it ; but it required attention, as 
it was handed to the presiding Justice of the Court of Oyer 
and Terminer. He then gave his decision in these Avords : 

" In expecting the case to be tried, counsel thought it part of good 
tftctics to prevent the Judge, then sitting, from presiding. It was 



484 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

an attempt, judging by signatures of distinguished counsel, to intimi- 
date the Judge. Tlie counsel sought vainly for a precedent, and will 
fail in seeking, here or in England, for a case of a tribunal of Justice 
not taking notice of a paper of such a character. If such a paper were 
presented to an English Judge by counsel, clothed as the English 
Judges are with powers which the Constitution withholds from our 
Judges, not one of them would be sitting here now, and not one of them 
would find his name, one hour after, on the roll of counsel." (Ap- 
plause in Court, which was promptly checked by the Judge.) 

"As God, is my judge," continued Judge Davis, "what I feel it my 
duty to do, I do, not from personal motives, but from a solemn sense 
of duty to the Court, the Bar. and above all, to the administration of 
Justice. No lawyer is justified in any act for the sake of his client, 
which renders him amenable to the bar of his own conscience, or tends 
to degrade the tribunal before which he appears, or lessen respect for 
that oiEcial authority on which so much depends for the preservation 
of our institutions. I must make the mark so deep and broad that all 
members of the Bar will know, hereafter, that all such efforts are open 
to (ensure and punishment by fine, as the law permits. I fine William 
Fullerton, John Graham, William O. Bartlett, $350 each, and order 
that they stand committed until the fine is paid. Mr. Burrill's position 
has already been explained, and Mr. Field is three thousand miles away 
from the jurisdiction of the Court. In respect to the younger members 
of the Bar, who have signed the paper — Elihu Root, Willard Bartlett, 
and William Eggleston — I have this to say : I know how young law- 
yers are apt to follow their seniors. Mr. Eggleston did not take active 
part in the trial, and I do not speak of him. The other two younger 
lawyers displayed great ability during the trial. I shall impose no 
penalty, except what they may find in these few words of advice: I ask 
you, young gentlemen, to remember that good faith to a client never 
can justify or require bad faith to your own consciences, ahd that how- 
ever good a thing it may be, to be known as successful and great law- 
yers, it is even a better thing, to be known as honest men. Proper 
orders will be prepared by the Clerk and submitted to me." 

After Judge Davis retired to liis chambers, the solemnity 
which had prevailed during the proceedings quickly disap- 
peared, and the scene became one of excessive hilarity at 
the expense of the committed lawyers. Laughter was loud 
and general, while the delinquents endeavored to smile. 
Having come prepared for the emergency, they produced 
pocket-books stuffed with bills and paid their fines to the 





■ 


■^^^P^ m 


i 1 


U^^^ 


■ ,y 


s, 


^ii 


i 





(Kcdiawii fidiu llaiijcr's Wfckly. Hy iktiuIssIoii. Coiiyright, is'.u, l,y lluipir A: Urothcis.; 
Da\ 11) I)l|)l.i:V FlKhD. 



DAVin Dl'DI>EY FIF.LD'S CTIAI.I.F.XGE. 485 

Clerk, amidst the o-reatest merriineiit. Tlie nioi-al elTeet of 
this vindication of Judicial dignity and the administration 
of Justice was deep and lasting. Since then, no meniher of 
the Bar in this City has been known to follow the prece- 
dent set by these eight distinguished hiwyers. 

But the comedy has yet to be told. The two young law- 
yers. Root and Bartlett, who escaped fines, and instead re- 
ceived good advice and compliments, wei-c the two real 
culprits ; for it was they who prepared the offensive paper 
and submitted it to their elder associates for signature, 
which fact, being discovered, turned the laugh, to a certain 
extent, on Judge Davis. 

A few evenings after David Dudley Field's return from 
Europe, he addressed the Bar Association on the contempt 
proceedings, which had been disposed of in his absence, 
and concluded with great emphasis : " The learned Judge 
(Davis) stated that I was then separated from him by three 
thousand miles of water, but he forgot to say that he was as 
far av/ay from me as I was from him. I am now back 
in my own country and in my own City, and am now ready 
to answer him on that or any other subject in connection 
with the case," It was thought by some that Judge Davis 
would take up this challenge ; but the matter was per- 
mitted to drop. 

Some time after this, an incident occurred, which showed 
how bitterly Field felt against Judge Davis, how wlther- 
ingly sarcastic he could be, and how he could shrewdly give 
vent to his bitterness under cover, and make a joke of it at 
the same time. 

Judge Sutherland retired from the bench, at the period 
to which I refer, and all the leading lawyers came together 
at a public banquet to do him honor. Among the rest were 
David Dudley Field and Justice Noah Davis, who sat oppo- 
site each other near the head of the table. After the usual 
preliminaries. Field arose to make the opening address, and 



486 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

to propose resolutions in honor of the retiring Judge, who 
occupied a seat at the right hand of the chairman. 

Field now saw that he could get a dig at Davis over 
Sutherland's shoulder, and determined to avail himself of 
the opportunity. "With that suavity and dignity so charac- 
teristic of him on such occasions, Field bowed, and then 
began his double-barreled speech at Sutlierland and at Davis. 

He faced Sutherland and praised him for his amiability, 
and then slowly turned his body and looked at Davis, 
silently and meaningly, who was noted for just the opposite. 
He praised Sutherland for his fairness and utter absence 
of partisanship, and again turned and looked attentively at 
Davis, who was a notorious, though probably well-meaning 
and conscientious partisan. He praised Sutherland for his 
proverbial politeness to his brother lawyers and to counsel 
engaged in eases before him, and then pointedly glanced at 
Davis, who was often curt and abrupt in his manner to- 
ward certain prominent lawyers. In short. Field praised 
Sutherland for every good quality that he supposed Davis 
did not possess, turning and loV)king alternately from one 
to the other in a manner which said : " Look here upon this 
picture and on this." Throughout he preserved the most 
superb courtesy and an air of consciousness that all present, 
as a matter of course, agreed with him. 

The majority of those present saw the point of Field's 
manoeuvre as he proceeded. Enjoying the silent thrusts of 
the great orator, they instinctively turned their eyes to- 
wards Davis, who by this time evidently began to realize 
the sting ; for, although usually self-composed, he wriggled a 
little and his face grew red. He had no alternative, how- 
ever, but to listen in silence. Not only this, but by the 
courtesies of the occasion he was obliged to join in applaud- 
ing the very words which were intended to wound him, in- 
asmuch as they were ostensibly only encomiums of the re- 
tiring jurist. 



MAi;Kr,I) KVIDKNC'E OF GHATlTi;i)K. 487 

As for Field it seeincd to luive done liiiu ^^xxl, for liis 
face was radiant with smiles and for years afterwards li.) 
often chuckled over the episode. 

Hut while Field was a good hater, a story is told of him 
which t-hows that he was a man who had, among his other 
(jualities, the very rare one of gratitude. 

One afternoon, an ill-natured lawyer was denouncing 
Field in his absence and calling him hard names A 
member of the Bar, named Shearman, who happened to be 
present, took Field's side, though he did not know him per- 
sonally, and defended him warmly. The next day a friend 
of Field, who had heard the remarks of Shearman, asked 
him who Shearman was. "I do not know him; and 
never heard of him," replied Field. 

" Well," said the friend, '' he has evidently heard well of 
vou ; " and then he related to Field the particulars of the 
incident of the previous day. 

Field made no reply and seemed to take the account of 
the controversy in a cold way, and as a matter of no con- 
cern to him. But that night he wrote to Shearman. The 
note was short; it simply requested Shearman to call at 
his (Field's) office at his earliest convenience. 

Shearman by this time had forgotten all about his defence 
of Field and wondered what the famous lawyer wanted to 
see him about. Imagine Shearman's surprise when the 
rich, successful lawyer, in a matter-of-fact way, offered him 
an opening as a partner. Shearman was dumbfounded, for 
Field was really offering him a fortune. The gratitude 
was then on Shearman's side, and the firm of Field & Shear- 
man was soon a legal reality and of course a great success. 

This incident goes to show that even old, cold men have 
their tires under the snow. 



LETTER XXXIX. 

An Unpleasant Recollection for the Present Boss — Er- 
ratic AND Reckless Career of James Fisk, Jr. — His 
Daring Enterprises — The Gold Conspiracy and Memor- 
able Black Friday^Fisk's Jealousy of and Quarrel 
With Edward S. Stokes— The Woman in the Case — 
Fatal Meeting of the Rivals and the Shooting of Fisk 
— Pathetic Ending of Lawyer Lane, another Victim of 
the " Erie Clique." 

My dear Dean: 

At one time during the year 1873, three men occupied 
cells in the Tombs or City Prison, severally cliarged witli 
murder. One shot down a railroad magnate; the second 
shot and killed a man who had killed his brother ; and the 
third Avas to face a jury on the charge of murder, in having 
slain a man on Thirty-fourth street, near Second avenue, 
during an election brawl. These men were, respectively, 
Edward S. Stokes, John J, Scannell and Richard Croker. 

It is not my purpose to inquire into the particular crimes 
for which they were indicted, or express an opinion as 
to their guilt or innocence. Scannell was adjudged to have 
been insane at the time of the commission of his act and 
was sent to an asylum for the insane, from which he was 
released within a year. In the Croker case the jury dis- 
agreed ; and it is only fair to state that the almost universal 
opinion now is that he was guiltless of that charge. Stokes 
had three trials. At the termination of the first trial, in 
January, 1873, he was found guilty of murder in the first 
degree. On a bill of exceptions presented by his counsel 
he obtained another trial. His last trial took place in the 
month of October, IS^'S, when he was found guilty of 

488 



NOTABLE INMATES OF THE TOMBS. 4S!) 

niauslaughter iii the fourth degree, and uu Saturday, 
November 1, 1873, he was conveyed to the State Prison at 
Sing Sing nnder a sentence of contineincnt for a period of 
four years. For good conduct while in confinement, Stokes 
earned a commutation which shortened his term by some 
months ; but, at length, he, like his two prison associates, 
was restored to liberty. During their imprisonment in the 
Tombs, it is said, a strong friendship sprung up between 
the trio referred to, whicii has lasted nntil the present 
time. 

Richard Croker, a very poor man at the period spoken of, 
became powerful and wealthy after the fashion of a modern 
^fonte Cristo, and is, at the present writing, a greater 
Boss, in the political sense of that word, than William 
M. Tweed ever presumed to be. Of Bossism in its latest 
phases I shall have something more specific to say here- 
after. But, much as is said derogatory to Mr. Croker on 
the ground of ingratitude to others, he did not forget his 
fellow prisoners. When Stokes had taken a lease of the 
Huffman House, on Broadway and Twenty-fourth street, 
Mr. Croker made that establishment permanent headquar- 
ters for the Democratic State Committee, which drew to it, 
as guests, politicians from not only all over this State, but 
from the country at large. As to John J. Scannell, Croker 
managed to get for him several lucrative positions under 
Tammany Ilall, and finally landed him as President of the 
Injard of Fire Commissioners, while to his brother was 
given '' an easy job " in the Surrogate's office. 

But in this letter it was and is my intention to speak 
more particularly of the victim of Mr. Stokes' pistol, rather 
than of Mr. Stokes himself, because the victim, Col. James 
Fisk, Jr., held a prominent place in the public eye during 
the period when William ]\I. Tweed was in the height of 
his glory, and was in fact an intimate associate of the then 
Boss. Fisk made his first appearance in this City toward 



490 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the close of 1864, soon after wliicli he fitted up a cosj office 
in Broad street, and began to launch out on the sea of 
speculation with a recklessness that marked him either as a 
lunatic or as one whose faith in destiny was only equalled by 
the certainty that fortune would favor him. Wall street 
got the better of Destiny ; Fortune gave way to Ruin. 
Then Fisk took the cars back to Boston. On the way he 
met with a young inventor who had been disappointed, and 
the country is full of such unfortunates. Fisk condoled 
with the sorrowing man, and on reaching Boston induced 
a friend to buy the young man's patent for a song, having 
first secured an important interest in the invention — a 
small improvement of great utility, which eventually 
yielded large profits. With money enough in his hands to 
fight the Wall street tiger on a wide margin, Fisk again 
sought New York ; but before reaching the City he was 
introduced to Daniel Drew, who, pleased with the young 
man's "get up," constituted him his agent for the sale of 
the Bristol line of steamers. He soon after, with Belden, 
became Drew's broker, and dealt largely in Erie stock, and 
when, in 1866, Drew executed his first great master stroke, 
in bearing the market, Fisk profited immensely both in 
pocket and experience. 

In October, 1867, Fisk was elected a director of the Erie 
Railway Company. He was then identified with the Drew 
interest. " Uncle Daniel," as he was called, owned a ma- 
jority of the stock of the Erie road. Yanderbilt, master 
of the Harlem, the Hudson River and the New York Cen- 
tral Railroads, now sought to get control of all the roads 
connecting New York with the Great Lakes, and make him- 
self the arbiter of the commercial interests of the metrop- 
olis. John J. Eldridge headed a party interested in the 
Hartford and Erie road, and Jay Gould was his henchman. 
Eldridge and his. men, before the annual election for di- 
rectors, had co:iI .^sced with Yanderbilt ; Drew made a secret 



ENTERPRISE OF A FINANCIAL HUSTLER. 4'.M 

treaty with Vauderbilt; and iinally tlio three parties, none 
trusting the other, t'oriued a husi ness alliance. Erie stock 
went up when it was learned that Drew had been defeated 
for the presidency ; but, when the news came that the elec- 
tion was in fact only a ''guy," aiul that a complaisant di- 
rector had resigned in favor of Drew, the stock went down 
again over three per cent., yielding a rich protit to those 
who were in the secret. Fisk was one. On the day of the 
election, he and (touKI met for the first time. On that day 
risk's hair began to grow grey, and he was often heard to 
remark that, in the year succeeding that meeting, " he saw 
more stealing done than he ever dreamed of." 

The story of Fisk and Drew, Gould, Erie and Vauderbilt, 
from that day forth, was an eventful one. How Drew beat 
Yanderbilt at his own game ; how Fisk and Drew went into 
exile with Gould and Eldridge over in Jersey; how Fisk 
and Gould taught the world the value of injunctions, and 
showed how easily the Bench, with the aid of a man like 
Tweed, might be numipulated in the interests of '• virtuous " 
enterprises, I have already spoken of, in a previous letter 
on the great Erie Railway contest. After doing a dozen 
other strange and remarkable things, that invariably took 
the world by surprise, Fisk bought the (rrand Opera House, 
at the corner of Eighth avenue and Twenty- third street, 
and fitted it up as no other theatre in the land had been 
fitted up before. He rebuilt the Fifth Avenue Theatre, 
and leased the Academy of Music, thus having in operation, 
at one time, the then three iinest places of amusement in 
the City. He spent §30,000 to put his first opera bouffe on 
the Grand Opera House stage ; gave Max Maretzek carte 
'blanche to secure the best stars of the lyric stage in Europe 
for the Academy of Music ; and dazzled the people of the 
metropolis with his success. In the Summer of 1800, he 
became President of the ^arragansett Steamboat Company, 
and controlled the finest line of its kind in the United 



492 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

States, refitting the boats at an enormous expense. Then 
he put the splendid steamer Plymouth Rock on the Long 
Branch route. When the Erie Railway Company's offices 
were removed to the Grand Opera House, he established a 
new ferry from the Erie depot at Pavonia to the foot of 
Twenty-third street, and a free line of omnibuses from the 
ferry ran past the Opera House to the Fifth Avenue Hotel. 
I mention these facts to show you what activity and enter- 
prise this financial hustler displayed. 

Fisk and Gould were regarded, at the time, as respons- 
ible for the " Black Friday " episode, which wrought such 
havoc in Wall Street on the twenty-fourth day of Septem- 
ber, 1869, and into which was also dragged the name of 
President Grant. Fisk and Gould were prominent in the 
matter, but it afterwards leaked out that the real origina- 
tor or starter of that memorable excitement, or panic, or 
conspiracy, was neither of these men, but a man now for- 
gotten, though once almost as well-known as Jay Gould— a 
man from the city of Buffalo, named Henry K Smith. 

Like Gould, this Smith was a little man to look at, and, 
like Gould, he had a pair of keen little eyes. Like Gould, 
also, he looked something like a Hebrew, only his beard, 
what there was of it, was of a species of brick-dust red. 
Smith made some money in Buffalo, and then came to 
l^ew York to speculate with it. He " had a head on him," 
and before very long those who dealt with him found it 
out. In one little transaction, he got the best of Jay 
Gould, and from that date Jay Gould began to take a fancy 
to him ; for any man who could hold his own with Jay 
Gould was just the man Jay Gould was looking for. So, 
not long after that period, the stock-dealing world was 
notified officially that Smith had formed a copartnership 
with Gould, the firm's name being Smitli, Gould & Martin ; 
a firm which soon became a power in, and a terror to, " the 
street." By his association with Gonld, Smith got into 



THE MEMORABLE "BLACK FKIDAY.- 49H 

the inner circle of the '"• Erie clicjue," as it was called, 
which embraced three men : Jay Gould and James Fisk 
Jr., of the Erie Railroad, and Frederick Lane, a lawyer or 
factotum of the other two. Lane, like the well-known 
Benjamin F. Ihitler, had a cast in his eye, but, unlike 
"Ben," he was always smiling. These three men con- 
trolled all there was of money or power in the Erie Rail- 
way, and were hand-in-glovc with Tweed and Judges 
Barnard and Cardozo. There were millions in the "com- 
bine,'' and soon Smith added a fourth member to the 
" Erie clique." And it was just after Smith had thus, as 
it were, conquered the world of Erie that, it is said, he 
conceived the idea of conquering the ready coin of the 
whole city of New York ; and Smith communicated the 
idea to Jay Gould, who with consummate skill arranged 
all the details. Mr. Belden, an ex-partner of Fisk, was 
brought into the affair; also an operator named William 
Heath. During the excitement, William Belden bought over 
twenty millions in gold, without handling or paying out one 
dollar. Within three days the Erie clique and their associates 
had bought up all the gold there was in New York city out- 
side of the Sub-Treasury Department. The clique (or the 
conspirators) met twice, sometimes three times a day, in 
secret, of course ; determining the fate of millions of dol- 
lars in gold at each meeting. Smith, having started the 
ball rolling, kept quiet and let the other people play out 
the game, which soon ceased to be funny. Friday was se- 
lected as the day to carry the gold conspiracy through with 
a rush, because Friday was the last full business day in the 
week ; and its parallel was never before or since seen in 
Wall street. 

AVhile the fever was at its height — gold having run up 
in the morning to 165, being over twenty per cent, higher 
than the closing prices of the preceding day; while some 
men were almost delirious with joy, and others were going 



494 THIRTY YEAES OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

mad with despair; wliile the business community was being 
disturbed by an unwarrantable and outrageous shock, and 
the order of things generally disarranged — a telegram came 
across the wire that was soon to quell the excitement. 
The telegram read as follows : 

" Sell four millions gold to-morrow, and buy four millions bonds." 

George S. Boutwell, 

Secretary Treasury. 

Possibly no avalanche ever swept with more terrific 
violence than did the news of Secretary Boutwell's tele- 
gram into the Gold Room. The " bulls " were frantic, 
not to say furious and unmanageable. There was first 
a deadly stillness — it lasted but a moment — then came a 
roar of rage and discomfiture that was truly pitiable to hear. 
It was a frightful scene, a true and faithful picture of the 
gambler's miseiy, and one that has perhaps proved a salu- 
tary lesson to the young would-be dabblers who like to in- 
vest in speculative deals. It was estimated that the amount 
of gold bought and sold, on the day of the crash, exceeded 
five hundred millions of dollars. It would be impossible 
to give you in a brief space an adequate idea of the ex- 
citement of the day. All sorts of rumors were afloat 
during the afternoon, and in Brooklyn it was reported that 
the contest between the bulls and bears had culminated in 
a general riot, in which faces were disfigured, and heads 
broken. Large numbers of persons crossed the ferries to 
ascertain the truth or falsity of these reports, and in the 
early evening, Major Bush, of Brooklyn, received a tele- 
gram from Inspector General McQuade, of Albany, calling 
upon him to order his command to report for duty im- 
mediately, to " quell the riot in Wall street." The mem- 
bers of the regiment were of course notified, and gathered 
at their armory in uniform as soon as possible. But the 
order was shortly thereafter countermanded, and the men 
returned to their homes. 



BAD BI.OOD BETWEEN RIVALS. 4:)5 

And now for a brief exphmatiou of the conditions which 
led to the murder of tlie erratic co-operator with Jay Gould 
in the uieniorahle excitement I have just described. 

The differences between Edward S. Stokes and James 
Fisk, Jr., were of long standing. One night, in tlie month 
of January, 1871, Stokes, after having been followed from 
place to place by detectives, was arrested on a charge of 
embezzling money from the Brooklyn Oil Refining Com- 
pany, of which he was Secretary, the arrest being instigated 
bv Fisk, This was the beginning of bad blood between the 
parties. In 18G8 Fisk met in this city Mrs. Helen Josephine 
Mansfield Lalor, a very fascinating Boston woman, who had 
been, a few years before, divorced from her husband, Frank 
Lalor, an actor ; and the moment Fisk laid eyes on her she 
captivated him. He gave her an elegant establishment in 
Twenty-third street, near the Grand Opera House, and 
fitted it up without regard to expense. Her horses and 
carriages were the finest in the city, and the four-in-hand 
which she used at Long Branch and in the Central Park 
were much admired wherever seen. Fisk spent the greater 
part of his leisure time with his chere a)nie, and seemed to be 
bound up in her. One day, he received a note from " Josie," 
as he called her, requesting him to remove all his personal 
effects from her home, and advising him that she wished to 
know him no more. This was a severe blow to Fisk. 
Knowing that Stokes was a frequent visitor at Mrs. Mans- 
field's house, he at once divined the cause of her change of 
heart toward him and, having some money trouble, the two 
admirers of the siren became bitter enemies, each swearing 
savage vengeance upon the other. 

On Saturday, December 31, 1871, there had been an ex- 
amination, in the Yorkville Police Court, of Edward S. 
Stokes and Josie Mansfield on a charge of attempting to 
blackmail James Fisk, Jr. Mrs. Mansfield admitted that 
she had given to Stokes the letters written by Fisk to her, 



496 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 






but not for blackmailing purposes ; and also admitted tlia 
Mr. Stokes had visited her two or three times a week for 
year and a half. Mr. Stokes acknowledged his frequent 
calls, but said the acquaintance was an ordinary one between 
a lady and a gentleman ; and he denied, as charged, that he 
had ever talked with Mrs. Mansfield about the amount of 
money Mr. Fisk ought to pay for the letters he had written 
to her. At the tarrainatioii of the examination, the Court 
postponed the further hearing of the case for a week, and 
Stokes accompanied Mrs. Mansfield to her residence in 
Twenty-third street. He was seated with her in the parlor, 
when the door-bell rang, and a friend entered and told 
Stokes he had been indicted by the Grand Jury and that a 
bench-warrant was out for his arrest. He sprang from his > 
seat with an oath and, hastily donning his hat and overcoat, 
hurried from the house. He went directly to the Grand 
Opera House and inquired for Col. Fisk (I omitted to men- 
tion that James Fisk, Jr. was a Colonel, for in the midst of 
all his other excitements, he " dearly loved the military," ' 
and accepted the Colonelcy of the Ninth Regiment, New 
York State Militia). When Stokes learned that the Colonel 
was not at the Opera House, he hailed a coupe, sprang in, 
slammed the door, and told the driver to proceed at once to 
the Grand Central Hotel, on Broadway. Arriving there, 
he jumped out of the coupe, and bidding the driver to wait 
for him, went up the stairs of the establishment, made a 
search through the parlors of the house, and was about to 
descend the stairs, when he encountered Fisk, who was on 
his way up. 

Stokes had been informed that his examination, which I 
have so briefly referred to, was but the prelude to a much 
more damning kind of testimony to be adduced the ensuing 
Saturday. Ex-Judge "William A. Beach, the counsel for 
James Fisk Jr., he was told, was prepared to prove him a 
most disreputable character, the companion of gamblers and 




I Ucilriiwii fniiii llHrpfi'a Weekly. Hy peniilHsioii. i 

.Iami> Fisk. ,Ik. 



VAIAL encounter at grand CENTKAl, lloTKL. 4«J. 

thieve.-, aud a swindler and scoundrel himself; and counsel 
claimed he had testimony to show that Stokes had boasted 
that he could have sohl Fisk's private letters to ])rominent 
politicians, and that he intended to make a million dollars 
out of them. Stokes's motive was to be proven to have 
been nothing but disgraceful blackmail from the start. 
Moreover, it had been rumored that Fisk had, through 
counsel, concluded a compromise with Mrs. Mansfield, 
whereby she was to receive fifteen thousand dollars and go 
to Europe, and Stokes was to be left out in the cold. 

All of these causes, and the fact that his avowed enemy 
had thus far beaten him at every step, had ruined his 
character and made him a comparative pauper, combined, 
it was believed, to drive the unhappy Stokes to despera- 
tion. He insisted, on his defence, that the rencontre between 
him and Fisk at the Grand Central Hotel was totally un- 
premeditated on his part; that he had not the remotest 
thought of meeting Fisk on that day and at that place ; but, 
as he was going down, or turning in the act of going down 
the ladies' staircase, he suddenly perceived Fisk coming up 
and looking toward him ; that as soon as Fisk saw him, 
Fisk pulled a pistol and was bringing it up to a level when 
Stokes, to save himself, discharged two chambers of his own 
weapon, and immediately jumped to one side to get out of 
the range of Fisk's pistol. 

The evidence on both sides was conflicting. Stokes had 
arrived at the Grand Central Hotel at four o'clock, and 
passed up the stairs by the private entrance, as sworn to. 
At a quarter past four, Fisk drove up to the same entrance, 
and, stepping out of his carriage, inrpiired of the door-boy 
if a ^[rs. Morse and her daughters were in. This Mrs. 
Morse was said to have been the widow of the man who 
gave Fisk his first start in business, in Boston, and Fisk 
had provided for her and her family since her husband's 
death. The hall-boy answered that !ie thought Mrs. Morse 



498 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK. POLITICS. 

and her eldest daugliter had gone out, but that the younger 
Miss Morse was in her mother's room. Fisk requested the 
boj to show him up, and the two started, CoL Fisk leading. 

At that moment and before Fisk had mounted more than 
two steps, Stokes suddenly made his appearance, and a shot 
rung out which struck Fisk in the abdomen, passing down- 
ward, backward, and to the left, and inflicting a terrible 
wound. Fisk fell, shouting, " Oh ! " but immediately 
scrambled to his feet again, when Stokes again levelled the 
revolver and fired another shot, the ball passing through 
Fisk's left arm without touching the bone. Fisk turned to 
run, but fell a second time, and slid to the bottom of the 
stairs, where he was picked up by those who liad congre- 
gated on hearing the report of the pistol, carried upstairs 
to a room, where he was laid upon a bed, and the house 
physician was summoned. Stokes, meantime, had passed 
quietly down stairs into the ofiice, where he made the 
remark that a man had been shot on the stairs. The hall- 
boy said : " Yes, and you are the man that did it." Stokes 
made no reply, but calmly awaited arrest; and Captain 
Byrnes and officer McCadden, having been sent for, took 
him into custody. 

In the meantime, three prominent surgeons were sent for, 
as were also Jay Gould, Wm. M. Tweed, John Chamber- 
lain, Col. Fisk's brother-in-law and sister, and sevei-al otlier 
relatives. The surgeons were obliged to administer chloro- 
form before they could proceed vnih. an examination of tlie 
wounds. While under the influence of the anaesthetic, 
Fisk suddenly arose to a sitting position, and they were 
compelled to jump upon him and hold him down. The 
hole in his abdomen, it was found, was large enough to have 
been made with a minie ball. The chances were thouo^ht 
to be ten to one against his recovery. Coroner Young sum- 
moned a jury, and Fisk made an ante-mortem deposition, 
the substance of which was in accordance with the forego- 



DEATH OF JAMES FISKE, JR. 4fld 

ing statement, he fully identifying Edward S. Stokes as the 
person who shot him ; and Joliii T. Redmond, tlie door- 
keeper, corroborated Fisk's evidence. Whereupon the jury 
found a verdict that "James Fisk Jr., had received his 
injuries by a pistol shot, at the hands of Edward S. Stokes," 
and they were temporarily discharged to await the result of 
Col. Fisk's injuries. 

David Dudley Field, another of Col. Fisk's counsel, hav- 
ing been sent for, soon arrived, and under the Colonel's 
directions, drew up a will, in which he devised the whole 
of his property, whatever it might be, to his wife, his father 
and his sister. This done, it was thought best to put him 
under the influence of morphine, and he was soon sound 
asleep. He never recovered consciousness, and passed out 
of the world at an early hour the next morning, Sunday. 

And thus ended the career of a man who had all the dash 
and audacity of a Napoleon of finance, and but for whose 
early help, perhaps; Jay Gould would not have been able to 
amass the many millions he left behind when he, many 
years afterward, departed this life. Stokes is still alive, 
but, after trouble with one of his relatives, he lost control 
of the Hoffman House, of which he claimed to have been 
wronged ; and it is said that he has since led a life of 
probity, poverty and rectitude. 

It is affirmed that Jay Gould and Stokes, from the first 
time they met, always cordially hated each other, not so 
much because they were so unlike in their outward appear- 
ance, as because they were so like in their shrewdness, re- 
tice«ice and nerve. Stokes was a fast, gay liver, fond of 
display, with artistic tastes ; Gould was of a domestic, home- 
loving temperament, averse to display, caring nothing for 
art or anything but money. Both were first-class business 
men, cool, courageous, ])rudent, yet taking desperate chances 
occasionally. Partly, therefore, because too far removed 
from each other in character, and partly because, in other 



rm THIRTY years of new york politics. 

respects, too closely resembling each other, thej were al- 
ways enemies. When Fisk, Stokes and Mrs. Mansfield 
were bosom friends and inseparables, Gould kept on terms 
of outward politeness with the two last mentioned, but was 
secretly and utterly opposed to their influence with Fisk. 
It was said that, at one period of her erratic career, the 
Cleopatra of Twenty-third street tried her fascinations on 
Gould, with the idea of substituting him for Fisk in her 
expensive affections. The fair " Josie," who was in matters 
of her own pocket very shrewd, saw that Gould was not 
only richer than Fisk, but more substantial, more likely to 
last. Sooner or later, a man of Fisk's stamp would be likely 
to get into some scrape, but a man of Gould's kind could 
and would wriggle out of anything. So the adventuress 
" set her cap " for tliS little Jay, but unsuccessfully. In 
the latter period of Fisk's checkered career, when his friend- 
ship for Stokes had changed to enmity, it was generally 
held by those in a position to know, tliat Fisk's course to- 
ward Stokes was engineered and dictated by Gould, who 
used Fisk merely as the agent to his ends. And after 
Fisk's death at the hand of Stokes, it was Gould, in secret, 
tliat fought for retribution, not so much upon the slayer of 
Fisk as upon his own enemy. It was, no doubt, an intui- 
tive feeling of this kind that prompted Stokes to use the 
name of Jay Gould as he did, in the Court room, after his 
conviction at the first trial. 

When the Jury had pronounced the terrible word 
" guilty !" Stokes, who had in the meantime taken his seat, 
arose, turned sharply on Mr. Beach, one of the opposing 
counsel, and said : " Mr. Beach, you have done your work 
well. I hope you will be paid well for it." Col. John R. 
Fellows, who was Assistant District Attorney, stated that 
Messrs. Beach and Fullerton acted with him at the earnest 
solicitation of District Attorney Garvin, and without any 
retainer from Mr. Fisk's family. Stokes again arose and, 



PATHETIC ENDING OF A VENKUABLF. LAWYER. noi 

in a liarsli and unnatural voice, interrupted Mr. Fellows 
with the remark : " They receive their pay from Jay Gould. 
Why not speak it out ? "" 

I referred above to Frederick Lane, who was the lawyer 
or factotum of Gould and Fisk, when all three were known 
as the " Erie clique." It had often been said that Fisk was 
the hand, and Gould the head, while Lane was the eye of 
the " Erie clique," for Lane was always on the qui vive for 
legal obstructions and furnished all the law for Gould to 
successfully stand on. But when Stokes's bullet put an 
end to Fisk, and the Erie ring went to pieces — like the 
Tweed King, after the fatal Central Park ride of Auditor 
Watson — Gould saved himself at the expense of Fisk and 
Lane. No one can assert that he absolutely defrauded 
either Fisk (or his representatives) or Lane ; but he looked 
out only for himself. The result was that, while Gould 
held on to Erie and the Grand Opera House and doubled 
and quadrupled his wealth, Lane lost his grip and his Erie 
stock, and everything else he had in the world. And one 
day, while John Q. Hoyt, a New York banker and ex- 
Mayor of Chicago, was sitting in his business office, a poor, 
hard-up specimen of a man came in, and, shaking him by 
the hand — wringing his hand, in fact — begged him for 
God's sake to let him have a dollar. Then the mendicant 
burst into tears. He dropped into a chair, covered his face 
with his hands, and wept bitterly over his poverty and 
degradation. This poor, seemingly God-forsaken creature 
was Lane — the legal " lane " along which millions of Erie 
stock had passed into other people's pockets. Mr. Hoyt, as 
soon as he recognized the old lawyer, assisted him and tried 
to encourage him. But soon after this scene in Mr. Hoyt's 
office the poor fellow died — died not worth sixty cents, 
leaving behind him his old associate, Gould, worth more 
than sixty millions of dollars. Such is life ! 



LETTEE XL. 

Escape of " Prince Hal " — His Duplicity and Base Ingrati- 
tude TO A Benefactor — Mysterious Gathering at Genet's 
House — His Abduction Prearranged, Even if Assassina- 
tion Were Necessary — Imprisonment of Sheriff Bren- 
NAN AND His Deputy, and Death of the Former — 
Tweed's Conduct Under Arrest Compared with Genet's 
—Story of the Man Who Had Charge of Both Pris- 
oners. 

My dear Dean : 

I believe there is no place on eartli where one can meet a 
more interesting " old timer " than in the City of New York. 
By " old timer " I mean one who has been identified with 
passing events, social, political or semi-political, in this City 
during the last thirty years ; who has moved in the so-called 
higher circles of political life ; who is punctilious in his 
dress and habits, and, while perhaps not educated in the 
higher branches of learning, has a general knowledge of 
literature, and ripe intelligence on all the topics of the day, 
on which he can express himself with fluency and force. 
There are many such characters in our city, and it is not too 
much to say that an evening spent with one of them, in a 
quiet, social way, is not only a most agreeable experience, 
but a profitable one also. 

A few evenings ago I strolled into the cafe of one of the 
well-known hotels of New York and ran across former 
State Senator Cameron. The Senator, as he is still called 
by his acquaintances, although it is more than a quarter of 
a century since he held that ofiice, is a man of above sixty 
years of age, tall, broad-shouldered, and erect as a Comanche 
Indian, of easy manners and graceful courtesy, and, although 

503 



"PRINCE HAL" UNDER ARREST. M:} 

of sociable tendencies in tlie company of his intimates, bears 
himself with inflexible dignity towards people in general, 
indicating in his every movement that ho has not quite for- 
gotten the days when he wore the Senatorial toga. Seated 
in easy chairs, our conversation had not proceeded far when 
his attention was attracted to a man who had just taken a seat 
at a table, about twenty feet from where we sat. 

" You see that man over there i " he said, pointing to- 
wards him. " There is quite a history connected with hini. 
lie is one of the nearly extinguished lights of other days. 
Look at him now — worn, decrepit and withered, although 
he is not much more than sixty years old. No, it was not 
drink that did it. If he has contracted that habit, it must 
be the result of a sudden downfall in politics for which he 
was not responsible. You don't know him ? Well, that is 
William H. Shields, who, twenty-six years ago, was a person 
of considerable importance in this town. 

" Among the exciting things that followed upon the 
heels of Tweed's downfall was the conviction of State 
Senator Henry W, Genet, popularly known as ' Prince 
Hal,' for frauds committed in the building of one of the 
District Court Houses. He got the name of ' Prince Hal ' 
on account of his dash and liberality in spending money, 
(nearly all of it other people's money,) which he threw 
around like an American Monte Cristo. It was said that 
he would lose as much as twenty-five thousand dollars in 
one day on a race track, without in the slightest degree 
disturbing his joviality, and that he kept personal retainers 
on his staff, after the manner of Tweed himself. His 
losses at the gaming table were also the subject of much 
comment. But he had fat opportunities of purloining pub- 
lic money, wliicli he took advantage of with dashing reck- 
lessness. He was a prime favorite among the sporting and 
political fraternity, and his conviction was the sensation of 
the hour. 



504 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

"•Matthew T. Brennan was then Sheriff of New York, 
and Shields was married to his favorite niece. At the time 
of Genet's conviction, Shields was Chief Officer of the 
Court of Oyer and Terminer and Deputy-Sheriff. He was 
the Sheriff's confidential officer, and when Tweed was 
taken into custody, during the three days that elapsed 
between his conviction and his sentence, it was Shields 
who had charge of him. He slept at Tweed's house, 
at Forty-Third street and Fifth avenue, every night, ac- 
companied him in the day time around town, nearly every 
day visiting with him the club of the Stable Gang, as it 
was called, corner of Elizabeth and Bayard streets, where 
Tweed met his old genial companions. Judge Scott, Laith 
Hall, George Butts, Charlie Hall, James lugersol, Dave 
Miller and others. After Tweed's sentence, in November, 
18Y3, Shields took him to the Tombs, and ten days later 
lodged him safely in the Penitentiary on Blackwell's Island. 
Besides, Shields took a large number of convicts, many of 
them dangerous outlaws, to States Prison, without mishap 
of any kind, during the three years he served under his 
uncle-in-law, Sheriff Brennan. He was a tried and faithful 
official, and had justly won his chief's confidence. So that 
when such a distinguished prisoner as ' Prince Hal ' needed 
' protection ' he was put in charge of Shields. 

" Genet escaped from Shields by a mean trick. As a 
special favor he accompanied Genet to his home to let 
him take farewell of his wife, and he escaped to the 
back-yard through a window upstairs. Sheriff Brennan and 
Shields were imprisoned for thirty days in the County jail. 
Brennan had held many important offices, prior to this 
time, having been Police Justice, Comptroller and Police 
Commissioner, in each of which he served the people satis- 
factorily. He was a very proud man, was then getting old, 
and was so deeply mortified by his imprisonment and the 
abuse he received from the public press that he never recov- 



THE VICTIM OF UENl'/r-!^ PEKFIDV. 



ftoS 



ered hi^ former self. After getting out of prison lie kept 
to liis house, and although up to this episo.le he was one of 
the most iKipular men in New York, he never agam took 
any further interest in pubhc affairs, and died not long after 
in comparative obscurity. Shields was an ambitious young 
man, of excellent appearance and manners, active and cour- 
ageous. It was openly intimated in the public pfess that he 
litid received a large sum of money for conniving at the 
escape of Genet, but events have proved this to be a cruel 

falsehood. i i • i <. 

'' At that time, to my own knowledge, Shields had bright 
political prospects. A few weeks before he was offered a 
nomination from his own district for the lower branch of 
the Legislature, but declined because he was on the ' slate ' 
for the then important office of Coroner, to be filled the fol- 
lowingyear. From the day he got out of prison tvventy-six 
years ^ago, he has been known to be without money. He 
lost histoid in politics, and has been ever since trying to 
turn his hand to many things; but the clouds seem never 
to disappear, and he had never been able to get on his feet. 
Manf years ago he left this city and went to Mount Vernon, 
in Westchester Countv, where he has tried to eke out a liv- 
ing as an Insurance and Real Estate agent. But here he 
comes this way," said the Senator. " Perhaps he might tell 
us the particulars of how Genet escaped from him." 

As he was passing by, the Senator hailed him, whereupon 
Shields approached us. 

" How do you feel, old fellow? " said the Senator. 
" Well, I am dragging along as best I can," said Shields, 
dejectedly. Having been introduced to me, he said : " Oh, 

yes, I remember Mr. as a member of the Legislature." 

Then as he took a vacant seat beside us, the Senator said : 
" I have been just talking about you in connection with the 
escape of Genet, which brought ycnx so much trouble, and 



506 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

as I have never heard the exact particulars, it would be 
interesting to have them from your own lips." 

"Well," said Shields, wearily, " I do not permit myself 
even to think of that incident, as I wish to avoid a sub- 
ject which has been so painful to myself and family. I 
know that the public have never properly understood the 
affair. Grenet's escape was the result of a conspiracy, hatched 
by a lot of desperate men who were his pals on the race- 
track and in the gambling-houses, and who were deter- 
mined to secure his escape at any cost — even, I believe, 
from what I heard afterward, to the extent of murdering 
me. Now I will give you the exact facts, and you can 
judge for yourself. 

" After the verdict of the Jury, the Court remanded 
Genet into the custody of the Sheriff until the following 
Saturday morning, when he was to be brought up for sen- 
tence. As I took charge of him, he asked me what I was 
going to do. I said it was my duty to lock him up in the 
Tombs. Then he asked if I wouldn't keep him out of 
prison, at least until he was sentenced. Well, you see, I 
liked Genet, and he being a prominent man, having been 
our former County Clerk, and then State Senator, I said I 
would agree to take him to the Astor House, and keep him 
there until Saturday. Genet then gave me a list of friends, 
among whom were John McQuade, Ed. Moore, Jack Daw- 
son, Peter McGinnis and one or two others, that he would 
like to see at th3 Astor House ; but it was understood that 
his place of confinement was to be kept secret from all 
others, especially from the newspaper reporters. The 
favors extended some time before to Tweed, when a 
prisoner, were severely commented upon by the press, and 
we thought it advisable for the Sheriff's officers to avoid 
blame in this case. So, to out-flank the reporters, I took 
Genet out through the Chambers street entrance of the 
Court House where a carriage was in waiting. Pretending 



TRUK STOltY (»F A MKAN Tl{I( K J507 

tliut we were f^oinp; to the Tonil>s, we drove ra])i(lly to 
Broadway, then up Broadway to make believe tliat when we 
i^ot as far as Franklin street we would turn towards the 
Tombs; but, instead, we dashed up as far as Canal street, 
along Canal street to West Broadway, thence to Vesey 
•street, up Vesev street to the ladies' entrance to the Astor 
House, through which we passed, and immediately secured 
a handsome suite of rooms. Tlien, fearing that maybe I 
was not doing right in taking this responsibility without 
consulting the Sheriff, and it being then about 8 o'clock 
in the evening, I told Genet that we would have to go up 
to the Sheriff's house to get authority for what I was doing. 
So we took a carriage and went there. The Sheriff received 
us in his library, and expressed sympathy for Genet in his 
troubles. Then I told the Sheriff the proposed plan of 
keeping Genet in the Astor House. 

" Sheriff Brennan turned to Genet and said : ' Harry, in 
granting you this favor, I hope you will take fo advantage 
of me or this young man Avho has charge of you.' 

" ' Why, Sheriff,' said Genet, ' I would not do anything 
that is not honorable to you or your officers, and I solemnly 
pledge you my sacred word of honor that nothing wrong 
shall happen.' 

" Then the Sheriff \vas satisfied, and consented to the ar- 
rangement, after which we returned to the Astor House. 
During the time we were at the Astor House there were 
several men coming in and out, talking privately to him, 
such as Murray the gambler, who then kept his place at 
Eighth street and Broadway, Joel O. Stevens, Ed. Moore, 
and others that I didn't like, and a flash of suspicion 
crossed my mind that they might be putting up a job. 
Joel O. Stevens was then under- Sheriff and my superior 
officer, and he came there every afternoon and appeared 
to be very close with Genet, so that at once disarmed 
me from suspicion. Things went on this way until Satur- 



S08 THIRTY YEARS Ot' NEW YORK POLITICS. 

day morning, when I took Genet to Court to be sen- 
tenced ; but, bis lawyer having made some motion, the 
Judge remanded him still further until Monday morning. 
After we got out of the Court room Genet asked me to take 
him across the street to the United States Court Building, 
which was then in Chambers street, saying that he wanted 
to see John I. Davenport, the notorious Republican Super- 
visor of Elections. Davenport took Genet into his private 
office, closing the door and leaving me in the main room. 
This was about eleven o'clock in the morning. 

While I was waiting there, to my surprise, in walked 
Sheriff Brennan himself, having learned somehow that I 
had taken the prisoner there. He handed me an anony- 
mous letter, which he had received that morning, warning 
him that a plot was on hand to secure Genet's escape. I 
told the Sheriff that I saw nothing yet on which I could 
really base a suspicion, but I asked him to let me lock my 
prisoner in ||ie Tombs so as to take no risk whatever. The 
Sheriff hesitated, and muttered that he did not like to do 
anything harsh. I then knocked at the door of the room 
where Genet and Davenport were and I called Genet out, 
and handed him the anonymous letter. After he read it, 
he pleaded with the Sheriff that the letter was nothing but 
malice, and he again solenmly stated that he would play no 
mean trick. This satisfied tlie Sheriff once more, and we 
returned to the Astor House. During these days, Genet's 
lawyers tried to get a stay, but failed ; and now Genet felt 
sure that he would be sentenced on Monday morning. On 
Sunday evening, about seven or eight o'clock, there were 
several of his friends in his rooms at the Astor House, and 
amongst them were gambler Murray, Ed. Moore and Joel 
O. Stevens. It was arranged that I should take Genet that 
evening up to his house at One Hundred and Twenty-fifth 
street and Second avenue, to transact a little business and 
take leave of his wife. 



HOW GENET MADE HIS ESCAPE. 509 

Ed. Moore said that I niiist be tired out, and that it 
would bo better for Deputy- Sheriff McGinnis, who was 
present, to take charge of Grenet in going there, so that I 
could take a rest. I went across the room to Stevens, my 
superior officer, and told him of the suggestion. After 
thinking a little while, he said tliat I had better continue as 
I was, as it was the Sheriif's orders. So we started out^ 
Genet and myself — with my assistant, Michael Cahill, in a 
carriage. On our way up we called at the Brower House 
and had a few drinks. We lingered so long there, the pro- 
prietor of the Brower House, Joseph Crocheu, being an in- 
timate friend of Genet, that we didn't arrive at his house 
until near midnight, 

"■ "When we went into Genet's house, we found about 
sixty of his friends in the parlor, with plenty of whiskey 
for them to drink. Of course I cannot recall the names of 
all who were there, but I know that Ed. Moore, Jack 
Dawson, [Murray, Tom Walsh, George Lynch, Ed. Hyde, 
a race -track man, Pliil. Jonas, ex- Judge Pearson and 
Jeff Crombie were present. Genet remained in the 
parlors among them, chatting with everyone all around, 
for about half-an-hour, and then went up stairs. After 
waiting for about an hour, and Genet not making his 
appearance, I asked some of those present if Genet had 
yet come down stairs. Jack Dawson replied, carelessly, 
that he was up stairs and would be down very soon, he ex- 
pected. Not satisfied wnth this, and some dread coming 
over me on account of the anonymous letter and the other 
circumstances related. 1 rushed up stairs in search of him. 
His wife met me at the head of the stairs and, in answer to 
my inquiry, said that he was not there and that she thought 
he was down stairs. Whereupon I went past her, and pro- 
ceeded to search the rooms. Not finding him, and now 
thoroughly alarmed, I returned to tlie parlors and con- 
fronted his intimate friends Moore, Dawson and Murray 



510 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and others, and asked if there was a foul deal. But they as 
sured me that there was no such thing, and that if Harry 
had left the house he would surely be back again. Then I 
looked and saw my carriage was still outside. I jumped in 
and gave instructions to drive me to the Eemsen House, on 
Third avenue, thinking that perhaps Genet had gone there 
to bid goodbye to the proprietor, Jolm Black, who was a 
close friend of his. When Black told me that he had not 
seen Genet and that he knew nothing of his whereabouts, 
I got bewildered. I then drove around to Ed. Moore's 
house at One Hundred and Seventeenth street and Avenue 
A, and rang the bell furiously. Almost immediately Ed. 
Moore, with his overcoat and hat on, opened the door, and 
seemed startled to find that it was I who called, and looked 
as if he expected someone else. He protested that he knew 
nothing at all of what had become of Genet. Notwithstand- 
ing my pleadings not to have me ruined forever, I had to 
leave without getting any satisfaction. Again I hastily re. 
turned to Genet's house, and found that all the gang had 
left. I then realized that I was tricked and cheated ; I 
knew that his escape was the result of a well-laid plot ; and 
then I completely broke down. How could I face the 
Sheriff, and how could I face the public ? 

" What I suffered from that time, now about five o'clock 
in the morning, until I went to the Sheriff's ofiice, to give 
myself up to my chief, no one who has not gone through 
such an experience can realize. When I told my tale to the 
Sheriff — which I was only able to do imperfectly, for I 
sobbed and cried like u child — he uttered no word of rebuke. 
He was greatly moved, but was calm and composed. 

" For the next few weeks diligent search was made for 
Genet, but all to no purpose. 

" Then came an order from the Supreme Court (Judge 
Daniels) to bring Sheriff Brennan and myself before him, 
,and after some argument we were both condemned to im- 



SIIIKLDS' KlXOLLECTlONS OF TWEED. Ml 

])risi)iiiiieiit ill the Couiih- juil for thirty ^lajs. AVliilo we 
Mere in jail stroui^ efforts were iiuule to have us indicted 
l>y the Grand Jury for additional punishment; ))ut under 
the circumstances the Grand Jury refused to indict. We 
were denomiced and hounded by the public press, — myself 
))articuh\rly — as though we had committed a great crime, 
when the truth is that we did nothing more than extend a 
usual kindness to a prisoner." 

Here Shields became visibly affected, and was about to 
leave, when the Senator said : '• Shields, I believe your story 
absolutely, and so must every man who has followed your 
career from boyhood." 

Having called for more refreshments, the Senator swung 
oft' to another subject. "Under your charge, Shields," said he, 
"you have had many prisoners great and small. Of whom, 
among them all, have you the pleasantest recollection ? " 
" AVell," said Shields, recovering himself, '" I have no hesi- 
tation in saying that, after some days' experience with him 
as my prisoner, William M. Tweed was the finest character 
in distress I ever knew. I am not going to say anything 
about what he was guilty of in public affairs, but, as man to 
man, I believe he was the soul of honor. Here was a man, 
who only a short time before had the power of a king, now 
a convict in my charge ; yet no word of reproach for anyone 
escaped his lips. When mention was made of men whom 
he took out of poverty and raised to wealth and prominence, 
who now deserted him, and were afraid to be seen recogniz- 
ing him, it only brought from him a sad smile, but no criti- 
cism whatever. Not only this, but forgetting, you would 
imagine, his own great grief, he was anxious about even 
my comfort. He treated me, when I slept at his house, in 
the same manner that a gentleman Mould treat his most 
honored guest. I could go to sleep and never have the 
most remote idea that he Avould play any mean trick upon 
me. Every word he uttered showed him to be full of 



hl2 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLlfJC^, 

sympathy for liis fellow man, and I tell you tliat notwith. 
standing the fact of the proofs against him, he loved New 
York City. No use of talking about this now, because no 
one will believe it, but he expressed the hope that no mat- 
ter what became of him, New York would yet be the great 
City of the world. I heard his son, one day, denounce 
Charles O'Conor for some bitter public statement he made 
against his father, and Tweed said, stopping him, ' O'Conor 
thinks he is doing his duty, my boy.' 

" Tweed was brave as a lion all the time he was in my 
company, so to speak," continued Mr. Shields. "In fact, 
having perfect confidence in the success of his lawyers, he 
was all the time cheerful and ready for a joke. I re- 
member, dm'ing one of my visits with him to the head- 
quarters of the Stable Gang, in Bayard street, just as we 
entered, ' Hank ' Smith, Tweed's Republican confrere in 
the Board of Supervisors, after warmly greeting him, and 
shaking his hand, said ' Boss, we were just listening to a 
story about you and Riley's liberty-pole. McDavidson 
was telling us how mad you once got, when foreman of 
Big Six, because your engine could not throw water over 
the top of Riley's pole, and how you endeavored to put up 
a job on the other fire laddies by hiring a sailor to climb 
the pole at night and cut off six feet of it, so that when 
next Big Six came to throw water she could accomplish 
what all the other engines had failed to do.' 

" ' That's true',' said Tweed, with a hearty chuckle, ' but 
perhaps j\Iac did not tell you how the sailor tricked me. 
I promised him ten dollars to do the job, to which he 
agreed, but wanted five dollars in advance. I gave him 
the five dollars, and that was the last I saw of the chap 
for more than a year, when, one day, I chanced to meet 
him and demanded an explanation of his treatment of me. 
Then he coolly told me that, as he had only taken half the 
money he felt that he was only obliged to climb half way^ 



INSTANCE OF TWEED'S REMARKABLE COMPOSURE. 5l;J 

up the pole, and he had aouc this; lie had ^aveu me five 
dollars' worth of climb. The cool impudence of the fellow- 
dissipated all disposition to get mad at him, and I passed 
on, inwardly admiring his gall.' 

"'Yes,' said Smith, 'McDavidson gave us all that, but 
told us further that when he was last in your i)lace, over the 
Broadway Bank, some one, telling him the story, pointed 
out to him the sailor occupying the post of outside senti- 
nel. We had a laugh over the fellow's cheek in imposmg 
^,11 you— first pocketing your money, and then receiving 
an appointment at your hands.' 

- ' That's a mistake ' ; said Tweed, ' he did not impose on 
me. About two or three years ago, the sailor in 
(luestion had the assurance to come and introduce hiin. 
self to me as the man I had engaged to trim Eiley's 
liberty-pole, and adding that he had had no luck since he 
acted so mean about that job, asked my forgiveness and 
wanted me to give him a chance to keep him from 
starving. Well, I so much admired the fellow's audacity 
tliat, putting my hand in my pocket, I gave him a five 
dollar bill, saying : ' There, that will keep you from starv- 
ing, and it squares our account. I promised you ten 
dollars for the job, and you tricked me. Kow, I am going 
to try and make an honest man of you. Come and see me 
to-morrow and I will give you work.' He came. I ap- 
pointed him as an outside messenger, and I never had a 
better man in office. I believe the chap still holds the place. 
So, he didn't fool me. His cheek carried him through.' 

'' That was just like Tweed," Shields added. " If he 
was the 'Boss "Thief of the World,' as Lawyer Peckham 
once called him, but which I do not believe, he had a 
heart, as the bovs used to say, as big as a meeting-house 
I became so attached to him that there was nothing I 
would not do for him within the lines of my own duty. 
Before he was locked up in the Tombs, I went to tliQ 



514 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Warden, and at my request lie gave up to Tweed his own 
quarters. Having failed to get a stay, the time came when 
I was ordered by the Sheriff to take him to the Peniten- 
tiary on Blackwell's Island. I went to the Tombs to tell 
him. I felt so badly, in breaking the news to him, that I 
trembled when I approached him. But he was placid and 
resigned ; only he asked me if he would have to go on the 
same boat with the rest of the prisoners, who were gener- 
ally wretched men and women committed to the Island 
for drunkenness, and he was sensitive lest the pictorial 
papers might take his likeness in the midst of that motley 
and disreputable, looking crowd. I said to him that I 
would go to one of the Charities and Correction Commis- 
sioners and ask him to have the boat, which was to leave 
the dock at one o'clock, delayed fifteen or twenty minutes, 
so that when I got there with my prisoner, 1 could take 
him up to the pilot-house and screen him from public gaze. 
He thanked me warmly, and I took a cab and went up to 
the office of the Commissioners then at Eleventh street and 
Third avenue, and I met Commissioner Laimbeer. There 
was a great howl made at the time against any official 
who showed any courtesy to Tweed, and I feared Laim- 
beer would not have the courage to do it. Besides, Laim- 
beer was a Republican in politics, having got into ofiice 
on the downfall of the Ring. When I explained what I 
wanted, he said ' No ! ' with emphasis ; but, before I could 
say a word, he added ' Have your prisoner on the dock, not 
at one o'clock, but at three o'clock, and I will give you a 
special boat all to yourselves to bring him to the Island.' 
I thought Laimbeer acted like a brave man, and when I 
told Tweed, his eyes moistened, but he said nothing. His 
look of thanks for this little courtesy was enough ; and to- 
day, Senator, when I know what sorrow is, myself, I am 
proud that I did what I could to relieve the grief of his 
big generous heart." 



mCKORY TREES IN POLITICAL CAMPAIGNS. 515 

Sliields, after sluikiiiiji; liaiuls witli us, departed. When 
lie liud gone, the Senator said : '• I believe every word of 
that man's story. What is more, I am satisfied, from the 
character of some of the crowd that assembled in Genet's 
parlors on that eventful Sunday evening, tliat had Shields 
detected the prisoner in making his escape, and attempted 
to hold him, which Shields no doubt would have done 
even at the cost of his life, he himself would have been a 
missing and a dead man ! " 

I may add a word of explanation regarding Riley's 
liberty-pole, referred to in Shields' statement. It was the 
custom of enterprising tavern-keepers, when surroundings 
would permit, to erect a liberty-pole in front of their 
establishments, as much perhaps to call attention to their 
places as to display their patriotism. The liberty-poles 
were surmounted with a liberty-cap, in shape such as 
usually adorns the brow of the Goddess of Liberty — the 
pole being painted white, and the liberty-cap being gilded. 
Riley's polo, (located in a little square on West Broad- 
way, near Franklin street), was the highest in the City, 
and hence it was tlie centre of attraction for all the 
more ambitious engine companies when desirous of testing 
the water-throwing capacity of their respective apparatuses. 

About the same period of which I write it was the cus- 
tom of Democratic political organizations, especially dur- 
ing heated Presidential elections, to plant tall hickory trees 
adjacent to their respective headquarters from which to 
stretch banners and display other party eml)lems. These 
hickory trees were divested of all limbs, but at the very 
top was left a tuft of small branches and leaves, to show 
that it was a hickory tree. This custom began with the 
first Presidential term of Andrew Jackson, who was known 
as " Old Hickory," and during his first campaign trans- 
planted tall hickory trees were a great feature. 



LETTER XLI. 

Exciting Old-Time Primary in the Sixth Ward— Voters in 
Line During an Entire Night and Day— "Big Judge" 
Michael Connolly and Police Justice "Joe'' Dowling 
Exchange Backhanded Compliments— How a Ward 
Politician Tested His Influence— Getting "Ten Days " 
FOR A Presumption of Intimacy with "Joe" Dowling — 
Daring Encounters and Hairbreadth Escapes of the 
Sixth Ward Judge. 

My dear Dean : 

My last letter dealt with the treachery and escape of 
" Prince Hal " Genet, as dispassionately pictured by Wilham 
H. Shields, the custodian whom he betrayed and whom he 
left under a lasting cloud of obloquy. After Shields had 
gone, that evening. Senator Cameron and myself walked 
homeward togetlier, both musing for awhile on the per- 
versities of human conduct. 

At length, to change the tenor of our thoughts, I said to 
the Senator: "Matthew T. Brennan, while Police Justice, 
and Police Justice Joseph Dowling created a great scene in 
front of the Tombs Police Court one day, did they not ? " 

"ISTo," he replied, "it was not Brennan who had that 
trouble with Dowling ; it was Police Justice Michael Con- 
nolly. It is true that Brennan and Dowling had a great 
fight over the Primaries held in the Sixth Ward, but this 
was while Brennan was Comptroller. Brennan, after he 
became Comptroller moved up town and left the Sixth 
Ward, his native heath ; but he still wanted to keep control 
of the political strings in that locality. Judge Dowling, 
supported by Jolinny Stacom and other local political 
lights, opposed this programme and asserted that when 

m 



A RATTLING SIXTH WARD I'KlMAllY 



M' 



Mr. Brennan left the Ward for -ood he should let ^^o hi8 
grip on it. Besides, Dowling was ambitious to fill that post 
himself, and he thought this was a good opportunity to 
accomplish it. T don't believe there ever was another suc-h 
Primarv held in the City of New Yorl<, from every point 
of view AVhether vou consider the importanee of the 
prize involved-for the Sixth Ward then, as now, was th.e 
stron.diold of Democracy-or the prominence and power of 
the contestants, each having a large number of adherents 
^vho held office under their respective leaders, or the 
desperate character and recklessness of the great bulk of the 
two factions who would as soon fight as eat, that Primary 
is worth a prominent place in history. Both sides being 
thorough experts in the art of handling Primaries, there 
was no trick or device known in that particular sphere of 
crovernmental science which had not been put in operation 
The day before the polls opened, men belongmg to both 
factions placed themselves in line so as to cover the ap- 
proaches to the polling place, in order to prevent then- 
opponents from reaching the polls; but, both sides being 
.killed in this manoeuvre, the line was made up alternately, 
or very nearly so, of Brennan and Dowling men. They 
continued in this position during the night and all of the 
next dav until the polls opened on the evening of the second 
day Sandwiches and beer were served among the men at 
the expense of their respective leaders. It is not necessary 
to describe the numerous skirmishes which this condition of 
affairs provoked, but there were numerous charges and 
counter-charges of assault and battery as the result of it. 
Brennan won, and Dowling had to play second fiddle as 

before. r^ -, j ^i 

"But," I remarked, "didn't Capt. Byndars and the 

Empire Club take part in that Primary ?" 

"No," said the Senator, '"that was an entirely different 

scrimm'age, and happened some time before ; and it was 



518 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Dot at a Primary, but at a Nominating Convention. It 
happened this way : Capt. Rynders had long ruled the 
Sixth Ward with a rod of iron, backed as he was on 
" emergency " occasions by the Empire Club. " Con." 
Donohue, who was at the head of the Street Cleaning 
Bureau of the " Bloody Sixth," began to "feel his oats," 
and thought it was about time that he ought to have some- 
thing to say. So, when Rynders announced himself as a 
candidate for Member of Assembly, and began " laying 
pipe " for the nomination, " Con." Donohue concluded 
that the time to checkmate the arrogant Captain had ar- 
rived, and he made preparations accordingly. Dooley's 
" Long Room," in Duane street, was the place selected 
for holding the Nominating Convention, and on the 
appointed evening it was brilliantly lighted up. The 
attendance was unusually large, the spectators outnum- 
bering the delegates four or five to one. The Convention, 
to all appearance, promised to be as lively as a Primary, 
and as exciting as a prize fight. The Empire Club had 
come early and was present in large numbers; "Con." 
Donohue was also early on hand, and his friends were 
quite as numerous. The trouble began with the nomina- 
tion of a chairman for tlie Convention, and it ended there, 
for the meeting terminated with its beginning — it did not 
get beyond the proposition to nominate a chairman. 
Rynders nominated his man, and " Con." Donohue nomi- 
nated a representative of his side of the house. Then 
began the circus ; yells .first, and then blows. The Empire 
Club "sailed in;" so did the Donohue Sixth Warders; and 
in less than ten minutes Dooley's " Long Room " was only 
about half full, with " Con." Donohue and his friends inside 
of it, while the other half, comprising Rynders and the 
Empire Club, were on the outside. After that night, 
Rynders ceased all attempts at political advancement in the 



"BIG JUDGE" CONNOLLY AND "JOE" DOWLLNG. 510 

Sixth Ward. ''Con." Doiiolnic bt'came ruiing iiKUiarcb, 
and '' Matt." Hrennan was his idol. 

"To retnrn to the wordy (|uarrel between ' Big Jud^j^e ' 
Mike Connolly and Judi^e Dowliiii;- to Avhieh you referred 
a while ago: "Joe "' J)owlin^ was a eurious character in liis 
day. Very dressy and gay in ajipearance, lie walked with 
attempted dignity, after he became Judge, but in })oint of 
fact succeeded in only presenting a specimen of the Bowery 
gait. It was said that his early youth was spent in the 
employ of one Tommy Iladden who kept a well-known 
li(]Uor store in the Sixth Ward, until he iinally got an 
a]>pointment on the Police force. To a great extent he 
carried with him some of the characteristics of the rough 
element with which lie had associated in his younger days, 
lie was sharp, cunning and self-reliant. 

" Michael Connolly, many years before he became a 
Police Justice, was the proprietor of a liquor saloon. He 
was friendly, jovial, and harmless ; was regarded as thor- 
oughly honest, and his amiability carried him to the extent 
of entertaining his customers by playing on a violin, in 
which he showed, however, very indifferent talent. At the 
time when he was Police Justice, his stature was that of a 
giant. Huge layers of flesh encumbered his body. He 
had an immense, expansive, almost immeasurable abdomen, 
while his cheeks hung down over his shirt collar, which, 
taken in connection with his broad face, highly colored with 
good living, gave a look of prodigious area to the front part 
of his head. He dressed in black, Avore a high silk hat, and 
carried in his hand a stout ebony cane, surmounted with a 
massive gold head. lie was the very embodiment of good 
nature, and his kind heart and liberality to the poor, com- 
bined with his well-known social qualities, made him one of 
the most popular naen in New York. 

" From the diverse qualities of the men it can be readily 
understood that Judge Dowling and he could never agree. 



S20 I'HIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

One day, after Court hours at the Tombs, both Justices 
met on the sidewalk in Centre street, in front of the Tombs 
Police Court, and, for the time, forgetting their dignity as 
ornaments of the Bench, indulged in billingsgate, in the 
])resence and hearing of a crowd. Among the choice mor- 
sels which Judge Dowling let fly at Judge Connolly was : 
' You, you big stuff, I knew you when you sold gin at three 
cents a glass,' alluding to Connolly's early days. ' Yes, 
you ruffian,' retorted the Big Judge, ' and you drank lots of 
it, and never paid for it ! ' 

"But, although Dowling was apparently discomfited in 
this contest with Connolly, he was a man of unusually keen 
natural wit. His quickness of perception and his extraor- 
dinary memory as to jDrisoners brought before him were re- 
markable. He had been a policeman, graduated from 
Tommy Hadden's liquor store ; then, through the influence 
of Matthew T. Brennan, he was rapidly advanced to rounds- 
man, sergeant, and captain. Again, when Brennan was 
Police Justice, and was elected Comptroller, he secured the 
seat on the Bench, thus made vacant, for Dowling. So that 
Joe had ample opportunities of knowing all phases of human 
nature, before and after he had reached the Bench. 

" It was always claimed by Tommy Hadden that it was 
he who procured Dowling's first appointment on the Police 
force. From the day that Dowling reached that position, 
lie went forward and upward, while Hadden unfortunately, 
from about that time, because of his tippling habits, went 
backward and downward. Still he clung to the liquor busi- 
ness, and Dowling, being a patrolman in his neighborhood, 
kept up his intimacy with Hadden. This relation continued, 
during the several years that Joe Dowling was earning his 
promotions, until finally he reached the Police Justiceship. 
At this point, their relations became somewhat disturbed, 
because it would be out of the question to have Justice 
Dowling visiting Hadden's saloon, as he had formerly done. 



"TOMMY- IIADDEN AND IIIS "PULL." 521 

There were two suiuul reasons for this. In the iirst place, 
Iladdeii had been drinking so heavily that be began to ap- 
proach the stage of imbecility, being garrnlous an«l boastful 
of his former relations with Joe Dowling. Iladden never 
called him Sergeant, or Captain, or Judge, but sim[)ly 'Joe 
Dowling,' in order to show his cu-tomers how intimate he 
was with him. In the next place, if the Judge visited llad- 
den's, he would not only be subject to this annoyance, but 
he would be keeping alive the memory of his own early 
days when he was a bottlewasher for Hadden. Yet it must 
be said that Hadden never complained of this apparent 
estrangement on the part of his old friend. Indeed, from 
a business point of view it would not have been judicious 
to do so, for the mere fact that he had a ' pull ' with the 
.Judge not only contributed to his own importance, but 
attracted toward his saloon a lot of customers wjio were 
constantly liable to be taken up before his Honor, on 
various charges, from drunkenness to highway robbery. It 
will not be wondered at, therefore, that Iladden frequently 
ri>ferred to ' my friend Joe,' in his conversations with cus- 
tomers. 

'' At length Jim Huntley, one of the regular frequenters 
of Hadden's saloon, was arrested on a charge of intoxica- 
tion and disorderly conduct, and was promptly sentenced 
by Judge Dowling to ten days on Blackwell's Island. 
Huntley's friends hastened to Hadden and besought him 
to see the Judge at once and secure the release of Huntley. 
' Certainly,' said Hadden, ' and you bet I'll get him out in 
no time,' On this assurance, several treats were ordered, 
in which Hadden joined. 

" By the time that Iladden reached the Tombs Police 
Court, where Judge Dowling was sitting, the liquor, com- 
bined with the excitement of his mission, began to have 
a damaging effect upon him. But this made him only all 
the bolder and, entering the Court room, he proceeded down 



522 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the main aisle and approached the iron gate in front of the 
space assigned for counsel and the Judge's Bench. The 
officer in charge, observing lladdeu's condition, refused to 
open tlie gate, although Iladden had told him to do so very 
peremptorily, saying that he wanted to see the Judge 
on important business. The Judge, hearing the dispute 
and observing Hadden's condition, instructed the officer to 
' let that man in.' Whereupon Hadden looked in triumph 
at the officer, and leered at him. When he approached the 
Bench he laid his elbow upon it and smiled at his ' friend 
Joe.' 'What do you want ? ' asked the Judge, sternly. ' Say, 
Joe,' replied Tommy, in a confidential whisper, ' you sent 
me friend Jim Huntley yesterday to the Island for ten 
days.' ' Do you want to see him ? ' asked the Judge. ' Yes, 
of course I do,' replied Hadden. ' Then you go up for ten 
days to the Island,' said the Judge. 

" Thereupon the officer seized Hadden, who at first made 
a slight attempt at resistance, hustled him downstairs and 
locked him up in a cell. It is only fair to state, however, 
that when Hadden sle])t off his drunk later in the afternoon 
the Judge released him. Throughout the Ward there was 
great joking over Tommy Hadden's ' influence ' with the 
Judge. 

" Another display of Dowling's humor upon the Bench," 
continued Senator Cameron, " was not relished by a man 
arraigned before him for having severely beaten his wife. 
' You are a brute ! ' said the Judge, addressing the prisoner, 
' to have assaulted your wife in this manner. What have 
you got to say for yourself ? ' ' Well, your Honor,' pleaded 
the prisoner, plaintively, ' I forbid her to go into Gumbos's 
dance-house, and that night when I went in there, there she 
was.' ' But aren' t you in the habit of going there yourself ? ' 
inquired the Judge. ' Yes, your Honor ; but you know 
a man can go anywhere ! ' ' Then you go to the Island 
for ten days ! ' promptly rejoined his Honor, 



ROUGH EXPERIENCES OF A FEARLESS JUDGE. 533 

'' Yes ; Joe was a character in his day," said the Senator, 
as he bade me good night. 

The Senator was correct. Joseph DowHng was one of 
the most remarkable characters that has ev^or appeared 
in the history of New York Politics. For thirty-five 
years and more he was identified, directly or indirectly, 
with almost every stirring event in the metropolis. Like 
ahnost all the old politicians he was a "fire laddie," and while 
connected with Engine No. 7 many a deed of pluck and en- 
durance was recorded of him. At a fire in Pearl street he 
entered a building completely wrapped in flames, as if chal- 
lenging destruction, and brought out in his arms a woman 
and her sick child, leaving them only when they were safe 
in the care of terror-stricken relatives, while the cheers of 
the crowd proclaimed him the hero of the hour. 

x\s a policeman he was equally distinguished for his dar- 
ing bravery and for the " uattiness" of his personal appear- 
ance. But his uniform often got sadly tossed and torn in 
some of the rough experiences through which he had to 
pass. Those were fighting times, and many a tough en- 
counter he had with the members of the Dock Gang, among 
whom for awhile his duties lay. One is recorded in which 
he is said to have boarded a Chili bark, where a fight was 
going on among the sailors, and attacked the combatants 
single-handed with his club. Suspending operations upon 
each other, both sides turned on him, and having harmo- 
niously beaten and kicked him until they left him for dead, 
resumed their fight. He still however retained conscious- 
ness, and while the sailors were engaged with each other 
he managed to roll unol)served to the side of the bark and 
creep on the pier. Gathering all his strength, he summoned 
assistance, and boarding the vessel again, with a competent 
force, arrested the entire crew. How he escaped death and 
achieved this feat greatly added to his professional char- 
ftcter, and gave him the reputation of having as many lives 



524 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

as tlie proverbial cat. His numerous encounters and hair- 
breadth escapes would till a volume. "When the Prince of 
Wales was in New York and wanted to see the sights it was 
Dowlino; who escorted him around. The Prince took a 
gi'eat fancy to him. Many years after when Judge Dowling 
visited England, the Prince was one of the iirst to welcome 
him. " But somehow," said Dowling, " his Nibs never 
asked me home to dinner, and I never saw his mother even 
once." 

When in London, he made himself so famous by one of 
his exploits, that " Punch " proposed the erection of a statue 
in his honor. It was during one of his excursions among 
the lower ranks of London life, about whose habits he was 
naturally curious. He had retired to bed, leaving the gas 
turned down quite low, when, about three o'clock in the 
morning he suddenly woke up. Jumping out of bed, and 
turning on the gas, he saw two sturdy-looking ruffians at his 
trunk. Ashe approached they turned and grappled with him. 
The two men in boots were too many for one in his bare feet, 
and Dowling was tumbled. Grasping a chair, however, as 
he fell, he sprang to his feet, and attacked his assailants 
with such tremendous force that he literally beat them to 
the floor. He then called or rang for assistance, and 
marched his prisoners to the Police office. The "American 
Judge," as he was called in London, was a hero while he 
remained in that City. 

With his death literally passed away one of the old 
"stagers" from the scenee on which he had made his im- 
pression for over a generation. 



LETTER XLII. 

Eventful Career op John Mokrissey — Evolution of a Prize 
Fighter— Family Quarrels which Ended in the Roped 
Arena— MoRRissEY Emerges From His Surroundings, 
Turns Up a Congressman and Becomes a Power in New 
York Politics — Ceremoniously Visits New York's 
Mayor in a Swallow-Tail Coat — His Fearlessness and 
Audacity in a Political Canvass— How His First Speech 
IN the Legislature was Delivered — Defeated the 
Boss in His Own District— A Triumph Which Soon 
Ended in His Death— Pathetic and Touching Cere- 
monies IN the State Legislature. 

AIy dear Dean : 

I have had occasion, once or twice, in tlic course of these 
letters, to refer to John -Morrissey, and in a way which per- 
haps carried with it the presumption that you were as 
familiar as myself with that conspicuous ligiire in metro- 
]K)litan politics. No one of his time, not even Tweed, or 
John Kelly, was more of a star on the political stage than 
was Morrissey, and his origin was quite as humble, if not 
more humble than that of either of his two contemporaries. 

John Morrissey was quite a different sort of man from 
that which he was believed to be. lie was, in every sense of 
the word, a rough diamond ; a man of extraordinary energy 
and determination, noted for his integrity and for his loyalty 
and lidelity to friends, and brave as a lion ; but he had 
an ugly side when he chose to show it, knew how to 
" freeze on " to money, thought a good deal of himself, and 
during the early part of his career was surrounded by 
a rather rough circle of friends. Born in Ireland, lie 
came to America when quite young, and settled in Troy, 

525 



526 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Bensselear coimtj', in this State, where he evoluted into a 
full-grown American. Morrissey grew up to be a great 
favorite as a young man in Troy, which secured him the 
enmity of another young resident of that City, one John 0. 
Heenan, afterwards a noted prize-fighter. Their enmity dil 
not arise from crossing each other's paths in a social waj'' ; 
it was a sort of grudge inherited from their fathers. The 
elder Heenan was a great hand at cock-fighting. He and 
Morrissey's father once had a serious difiiculty about a 
cocking-main, when each called the other hard names, spent 
a number of dollars in " lawing," and died hating each 
other with an intense hatred. Their descendants took up 
the quan-el and had many a " spat." Young Heenan went 
to California, where he spent a couple of years at a place 
called Benicia, and learned how to be quite handy with his 
fists, through which he became known in sporting circles 
as " the Benicia Boy." Both he and Morrissey happened to 
reach New York City about the same time, and both had 
developed remarkable skill in what is called " the art of self- 
defence." 

For awhile after his arrival here, Morrissey found occu- 
pation as an emigrant runner, but all the time, as one of his 
friends stated, he was " chock full of fighting." He was 
powerfully built, strong as an ox, and seemed to be afraid 
of no one. His reputation as a fighter got so high that "Tom" 
Hyer, then a celebrated pugilist, became a little jealous of 
him and stigmatized him as " that blower from Troy," which 
led to a personal encounter of the two men on the corner 
of Canal street and Broadway, their arrest by the police, 
and both being placed under heavy bonds to keep the peace. 
About a year after this, Hyer had a prize-fight with the 
notorious " Yankee " Sullivan, famous in his day on both 
sides of the ocean. Hyer came off victor. In the mean- 
time, Morrissey had been taking the conceit out of an- 
otlier prize-fighter, named George Thompson; after which 



EARLY CAREER OF .lOll.N MoKlMSSEY. 527 

contest, he also hud a li^ht with '' Vankce " Suilivaii and 
whipped him ; and tlien lie was eager to liave a contest with 
"Tom-' liver, but somehow they never couUl come to satis- 
factory terms. One night at a sparring match llecnan did 
some very effective work with the gloves, which got to 
Morrissey's ears ; whereupon John, thinking it a good time 
to settle up old scores, sent his ''card" to Ileenan, with 
an intimation that he would be pleased to " exchange com- 
pliments '' M-henever convenient to him. 

A battle was arranged to take place at Long Island Point, 
Canada, about eight miles from Buffalo, New York. Ileenan 
had previously fought and whipped " Tom " Hyer ; so 
Morrissey in this contest was inspired with the hope of 
" killing two birds with one stone " — that is, of " lick- 
ing " Heenan and Hyer, or Hyer's conqueror, in one fight. 
Heenan put in all his best work at the beginning of 
the encounter. The first round lasted nearly seven minutes, 
and showed good work on both sides ; but Morrissey had 
much the worst of it; his nose was broken, and every- 
body believed Heenan would be the victor. Morrissey 
looked somewhat '• out of sorts;" but he soon recovered, 
like aV)ull-dogfrom a bite, and w^ent to work again M'ith a 
will. Before the fistic duel was half through, Heenan could 
only do what Morrissey had to do at first — stand punishment. 
He did not have strength enough left to strike ; he could 
only stand and be struck ; and after awhile, in the seventh 
round, he could not even stand up, and Morrissey was de- 
clared the victor, his success making him " the champion of 
America." 

Morrissey, who was then the favorite in sporting circles 
throughout the country, soon after this resolved to " turn 
over a new leaf," dropped prize fighting and opened a 
gambling-house, in which he gained celel)rity and made con- 
siderable money, both in New York and Saratoga, his 
houses being credited far an<i ilfai* for " square business." 



528 THIRTV YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

He still kept up, liowever, liis inherited taste for coek-fight- 
ing. Former Senator Henry W. Genet, in his palmy days, 
had a like propensity ; and he and Morrissey arranged a 
famous cock-fight, which came off in the presence of six 
hundred people, the admission being ten dollars a ticket. 
Twenty thousand dollars in beta were said to have exchanged 
hands on this occasion. There were three different contests, 
withiialf a dozen birds on either side in each contest. 
Morrissey's birds did well, but Genet's did better. In two 
out of the three battles, Genet's birds had the advantage, 
and so " Prince Hal " came off victor. 

Morrissey had some very warm and devoted friends 
among the " gentlemen gamblers " of the metropolis, and 
he made, through his success, some very bitter enemies 
among the fraternity. One of these was George Hill, who, 
to get even with Morrissey, opened an opposition game at 
Saratoga. Hill fitted up a cosy place on the Lelauds' 
ground, in the rear of the Grand Union Hotel ; while Mor- 
rissey's handsomely equipped establishment fronted on Con- 
gress Park, in the rear of Congress Hall. Hill proclaimed 
that Morrissey would never dare to cross the threshold of 
his place, or, if he did, that he would not leave it alive. 
Morrissey never " took the dare." George Hill was, per- 
haps, the only man John Morrissey ever feared. In a per- 
sonal encountei', Morrissey, being nearly twice the size of 
Hill, could have picked him up and thrown him over his 
shoulder; but Hill was a dead shot with the pistol, and 
Morrissey believed he had " murder in his heart." So 
while they were rivals in business for many seasons, at 
Saratoga, they never came in conflict. 

With success in the accumulation of this world's goods, 
Morrissey became ambitious, and he received in 1866 a 
nomination for Congress, anxious, as he said, to " drift away 
from the notoriety he had acquired as a prize-fighter" 
and secure a position in the political world. He served 



BOSS KELLY AND THE "CHAMPION OF AMERICA." M9 

two terms in Congress, and doubtless made a satisfactory 
record, for no adverse comment was passed upon him 
during his Washiunton career. Morrissey was an active 
co-worker in Tammany Hall up to the time of tlie " Young 
Democracy" revolt, in 1870, and he then ceased his con- 
nection with Tammany until after the downfall of the 
Ring in 1871, when, at the solicitation of Tilden, he 
joined Kellv, in 1872 in his effort to rehabilitate that 
organization-then only a wreck of its former self— and 
was hand in glove with Kelly until after the election of 
Mayor ^Vm. II. Wickham, in 1874. 

John Kelly always had a high regard for John Morrissey 
because, in his youth, Kelly, although not a professional 
pugilist, rather loitered on the "ragged edge" thereof. 
In their youth he and David C. Broderick (afterwards 
United States Senator) and another boon companion named 
William Lloyd, used to strike from the shoulder a good 
deal, and won some renown as an illustrious trio of " clever 
boys." Therefore, a man who had acquired the distinc- 
tion of " champion of America " was one to whom Kelly 
was willing to take off his hat. Besides, Morrissey had 
been, like himself, a Congressman, had never been guilty 
politically of any misconduct, and had unmistakably a very 
large following among the sporting men of New York, with 
whom Morrissey was very popular. Hence the two Johns, 
Morrissey and Kelly, often had confidential talks over men, 
matters and things political, while pulling together for 
the resuscitation of Ring-destroyed Tammany. 

In the fall of 187-1, as the time was at hand to select 
local nominees, Kelly, although having almost supreme 
control, thought it best to consult at least Morrissey, 
who had considerable strength among the rank and file of 
the organization, and who might be able to make some 
trouble " if things did not run a little his way." Kelly decided 
also to bring Countv Clerk William Walsh into the confer- 



S30 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ence. So the three met in a little room, about six feet 
square, in the County Clerk's office, to select the Mayor 
and other functionaries for the City anji County of New 
York. The duties these three politicians assumed did not 
strike them as at all unique or in any way extraordinary, 
and they approached the performance of the task with the 
business-like air and gravity of men who were commis- 
sioned by some hidden power to execute this great work 
for nearly one million people. 

The portentous meeting was called to order, as it were, 
with Kelly of course presiding. When the door of the 
little room was closed, and a guard placed on the out- 
side, so as to secure strict privacy, Kelly opened the pro- 
ceedings by saying : 

" Gentlemen, I called you together for the purpose of 
selecting candidates to be nominated next Monday evening. 
JSTow, there is a young man of excellent character and a 
neighbor of mine, William H, Wickham, who would make 
a good Mayor for this City, and I would " — 

Morrissey : " Hold on, Mr. Kelly, please ! I want Jimmy 
Hayes for Register." 

Kelly : " Let us dispose of one thing first and we will 
take up the others after." 

Morrissey, who had an inkling that Kelly favored Alder- 
man Richard Flanagan for Register, and fearing that Kelly, 
after he had secured Wickham for Mayor, would spring 
Flanagan, grew red in the face, as he said, determinedly : 
" If you want Wickham for Mayor, I want Hayes for Reg- 
ister. I don't go one unless you go the other." 

" I have not said that I was unfavorable to Mr. Hayes 
for Register," rejoined Kelly, diplomatically, " but the first 
in order is the choice for Mayor; let us dispose of this 
uosition, and then we will take up the Register." 

Morrissey, seeing Kelly's determination, shifted his 
position, and " feinted nimbly with his left." " Well," said 



A NOMINATING CONVENTJON OF TIIREK. .^-^l 

lu', " i)eivoiui]ly 1 have lu.tliin-,^ against Wickham, but 
if yon were to take oil yonv liaiuls from liiin and stop 
pressino- him, he could not carry tlie Convention. He is 
not known among tlie l)o\s/' 

This set Kelly thinking, and after a short pause he said : 
'• Mr. Wiekham can be made a very strong candidate be- 
fore the people. He is young, bright, and an excellent 
business man, and will give a good administration." 

'' There is no more popular man in the lower part of the 
City than Jimmy Hayes, where the strong Democratic vote 
is, and I want him for Register," said Morrissey, doggedly. 

Kelly knew that John Morrissey was a man whom it was 
verv necessary to conciliate. So he forgot his friend Flan- 
agan for the time, and consented that the nomination of 
Hayes for the office of Register should be conceded to Mr. 
:\Iorrissey, who then said : " All right ! I am now for your 
man AVickham for Mayor." 

The interview soon came to a close. Then Kelly sent 
for Augustus Schell, who had been " slated '' for the 
nomination for the Mayoralty, and told him that, in the 
interest of harmony, he had found it necessary to make 
such arrangements as would preclude him (Schell) from 
being the nominee for Mayor, at this time, and tliat it 
would be necessary for him to withdraw from the field. 
]\rr. Schell was astonished at Mr. Kelly's change of mind, 
but promptly acquiesced in his wishes ; for Kelly was 
i]oss. The gentlemen chosen by the two Johns were 
nominated (or, rather, endorsed) at the ensuing Tammany 
County Convention, but only one was elected. For, not- 
withstanding that James Hayes was all Morrissey claimed, 
very popular and in every way worthy of the suffrage of 
his fellow citizens, his Republican opponent was elected. 
This was largely owing to the fact that his opponent, 
Patrick II. Jones, had donated all the salary of the Regis- 
tership to the widow of Col. Charles G. Halpine (popularly 



53Si THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

known as "Miles O'Reilly"), wliile filling his unexpired 
term, and in consequence thereof had won the endorsement 
of the German or Ottendorfer Democratic organization. 

"Wm. H. Wickham was a graduate of the Volunteer 
Fire Department, and a very bright, active and intelligent 
man of business. He sought to bring business methods 
into the Mayor's office, and in doing this lie instituted cer- 
tain rules. Among other new arrangements, he placed in 
the ante-chamber of the Mayor's office an attendant whose 
duty it was to receive the cards of all callers, and their 
names were in a business-like way to be presented to the 
Mayor in rotation. One day, about a month after the first 
of January, 1875, without any previous notice, John Mor- 
rissey entered the City flail, and, it being the first oppor. 
tunity he had had, thought he would call and see Mayor 
AViekham, whom he had been somewhat instrumental in 
placing in that position. I may here remark that Mor- 
rissey was most gentlemanly in his deportment among 
gentlemen, but he had great dislike to the " putting-on of 
airs" by any one. Entering the ante-chamber of the 
Mayor's office, he, unconscious of the new rules, made a 
dive for the door leading to the Mayor's room, as he had 
done when calling on previous Democratic Mayors. The 
attendant, ignorant of who the visitor was, caught him by 
the arm, and requested him to take a seat and wait his 
turn, at the same time asking him for his card. There were 
several persons present whom Morrissey recognized and 
who knew him, and he felt a little mortified at the check, 
hut asked, with as much coolness as he could command, 
" By whose orders are you acting, may L inquire ? " 

"By order of his Honor Mayor Wickham," replied the 
attendant, in a somewhat dignified manner. 

"Is that so?" returned Morrissey. '"Well, give my 
compliments to his Honor Mayor Wickham, and ask him 
to tell 'Billy' Wickham that when John Morrissey has time 



MOKUlsJSEYo JOKE ON MAYoU WK KlIAM. 533 

to put on Froncli airs, he may call auaiii. (iood day, 
sir ! V xA-iul lie strode away. 

A day or two afterward, Jolin Morrissey, dressed up in 
fashionable style, with swallow-tail coat, patent leather 
boots, white kid «^loves, overcoat sluno^ over his left arm, 
and earryin<:: a book, was met by his old friend, John 
K llaskin, on Broadway, as he was about entering the City 
Hall Park. 

" Hullo, John," exclaimed Haskin, '' what's up uow ? 
Going to a wedding I " 

" No," replied Morrissey ; " not so bad as that. I've just 
bought a French dictionary to help nie to talk to our dandy 
Mayor. I'm going in full dress to make a call, for that is 
now the style at Hotel Wickham," pointing to the City 
Hall. '' No Irish need apply now," added Morrissey, with 
a. parting chuckle. 

And he was as good as his word. He did call upon the 
Mayor, just as stated, and, pulling out a card-case, requested 
the attendant to present him. The Mayor received him, 
laughed as heartily as he could at Morrissey's rebuking joke, 
and apologized frankly on behalf of an attendant so untutored 
as not to have known that there were exceptions to all 
rules. But the joke on Wickham got spread around and 
was the nine days' talk of the town. 

When the time came for the nomination of State Senators 
in the Fall of 1875, in some way, through the jar and fric- 
tion of politics, John Kelly and John Morrissey no longer 
" slid on the same cellar door." Some malcontents, headed 
by Thomas Costigan, had organized what was known as the 
Irving Hall Democracy, and Morrissey had there found an 
abiding-place. 

James O'Brien, who had succeeded Kelly as Sheriff 
of New York several years before, and who had been in- 
strumental in unearthing the Ring frauds which saw light in 
the New York l^imes, got a seat in the State Senate during 



534 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the upheaval in the Fall of 1871 ; and in 1873 John Fox, who 
had been an associate for many years with Tweed in the old 
Board of Supervisors, and who had also served a couple of 
terms in Congress, was elected to the State Senate in 
Tweed's old Senatorial district (the Fourth). The notion 
then seized Morrissey that he himself, with his experience 
as Congressional representative, might make as acceptable a 
Senator as either of the gentlemen named, and he accord- 
ingly "set sail for that port." As he and Kelly were 
" out," his only chance of success was to unite all the anti- 
Tammany element, and he had the audacity to select for his 
field of battle the Fourth Senatorial District, which had al- 
most invariably recorded 11,000 majority for the Tammany 
ticket. Perfecting his plan, he had himself nominated 
for Senator in that district, in 1875, all the anti-Tammany 
factions rallied to his support, and his nomination was en- 
dorsed by the Republicans, making the fight an open and 
square one between Tammany and anti-Tammany. Then 
the war of the clans began in earnest — -John Kelly and 
John Fox versus John Morrissey ; and before the campaign 
ended many demi-johns had come to grief. It was indeed 
a hot contest. Morrissey threw himself heart and soul into 
it, and in the district which had been so long an invincible 
Tammany stronghold, he came out a winner by a majority 
of 3,377 votes — much to the chagrin of " a pair of Jacks." 
Although he was a sporting man and a gambler, ran a 
race track and a faro bank, John Morrissey, after a fashion 
of his own, was a religious man ; and, strangely enough, 
the first speech he made at Albany, in 1876, was on a re- 
ligious-political question. A measure was before the Senate 
relating to a Roman Catholic institution, known as the 
"Gray ]S^uns bill," and the feeling for and against it was 
rising fierce and high. One morning, after listening to 
some red-hot abuse of the Roman Catholics, Morrissey rose 
from his seat, boldly determined to say something, but wa9 



"STACK FKICIIT" IN TIIK SKNATK CHAMBER. 5:15 

suddonly scizeil with ''sta^e fri^lit/' As he tohl a fiiuiid 
afterwards, '' he liad never felt so mean in liis life hefore ; 
taclclino; Yankee Sullivan or John C. ITeenan was nothinii^ 
eoniiiared to his condition." 1 le stammered and blushed like 
a school-boj. Most men in his position, would have been 
l.inghed at or coughed down ; but his associates in the 
Senate liked IVForrissej, and C(iurteously waited till he had 
time to recover from his fright. A bit of weakness of this 
kind was not discreditable to a man who had shown more 
than a dozen times that he was no coward. 

At last, he recovered his voice and self-possession. But 
when he started he clipped his words, repeated his phrases 
over and over again, and his grammar was a failure. It 
was evident, liowever, that he understood the subject he 
was talking about, and although his manner was poor, liis 
matter was sound, sensible and manly, and his utterances 
were more admired for what he meant than for what he 
said or the way he said it. When the Associated Press 
reporter telegraphed to the New York papers that Senator 
Morrissey had addressed the Senate on " The Gray JSIuns 
bill," the official stenographer received a request to tele- 
graph his notes to the Associated Press papers. The 
stenographer spoke to Morrissey about the matter, and 
found the Senator rather adverse to publicity. " I let my 
feelings lead me into it," he said, " and I am sure what I 
said won't read nice ; but if the public want it, I suppose 
they are entitled to it, though I am afraid the papers won't 
be so kind to me as my colleagues have been." 

The stenographer looked over his notes, and found that 
the speech did not " read nice." But he liked Morrissey, 
and determined to do him one of those favors often ex- 
tended to speakers by stenographers. He rewrote the 
speech, keeping in the gist of John's plain, blunt, common- 
sense words. The " revised " speech appeared the next day 
in the papers, and Morrissey was much complimented upon 



536 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

it bj his New York friends. Then lie souglit the sten- 
ographer and said : " My dear boy, I thank you for all 
the trouble you have taken ; I wish to God I could make 
a speech like what you have given the papers. It contained 
the very words I would have used if I had only known 
how to use them. I never went to school in my youth, 
like other boys ; I only wish I had. My ideas are all there, 
but the lay-out is so much better — I mean the whole thing 
is so much better expressed, that I feel like kicking my- 
self for not having in my early days struck out for books 
instead of striking out from the shoulder. Take this, my 
boy (handing him a ten-dollar bill), you have richly earned 
it, and may God bless you ! " And forever after the 
stenographer had the highest respect for John Morrissey, 
wh^se unpretentious manner in the Senate chamber won 
him many friends. 

During his Senatorial term Morrissey introduced many 
and voted for all the Reform (or anti-Tammany) measures 
which came before the Legislature ; thereby provoking the 
bitter hostility of the Tammany leader. The district from 
which Morrissey was elected lay in the lower part of the 
City and its population was made up, for the most part, of 
wage-earners. It was claimed that no district except the 
one which had elected Tweed in 1871, while under indict- 
ment, (for this was Tweed's old district) would have 
elected an ex-prize fighter and gambler. The taunt galled 
Morrissey for its reflection not only upon himself but upon 
his constituents. It was not his intention to return to the 
Senate, but a circumstance occurred which determined an 
opposite course. 

Kelly, being especially anxious to elect a Democratic 
Senator from his (the Seventh) district, in 1877, resQlved 
to nominate the strongest man he could find. It was one 
of the most wealthy and fashionable districts of the City. 
Augustus Schell, long a resident of this district, was a 



DEFEATINd THE BUSfci IN lilfe; OWN DISTRICT. ."ilfr 

man of 1iit;li standing in tl)C eonnnnnity. He was wealthy" 
and iiillaential. lie was u director In the Vanderbilt rail- 
road and was at tliis time Grand Sachem of the Tammany 
Society. Snch was the man whom Kelly announced as 
his candidate for the Senate in the Seventh District — the 
man wlioni he had "turned down" as a Mayoralty candi- 
date the previous year. To the surprise of every politician 
in New York, Morrissej' announced that he would run 
against Schell and beard Kelly, so to speak, in his own 
den. 

'' They say that no other district would elect me, but the 
Fourth," remarked Morrissey. " I will now fight Kelly in 
his own district iip-town and will enter the contest against 
his great champion, Augustus Schell," 

And so he did. The Republicans of the district endorsed 
him. The feeling ran high. Both sides were on their 
mettle and money flowed like water. It was a battle in- 
volving not so much the office as the prestige of victory. 
Although in poor health, Morrissey entered into a most 
vigorous canvass. During its progress he was violently at- 
tacked by a lawyer of some prominence at that time, John 
D, Townsend, who, in the public prints, accused him of 
being a gambler and a policy- dealer, and declared that he 
had been indicted for assault and battery, for instigating 
prize fights, for burglary, and three times for assault with 
intent to kill, and gave Tweed as authority for affirming 
that Morrissey was famous as a ballot-box stuffer and, in 
recognition of that service, he (Tweed) had sent him to 
Congress, Townsend also claimed that Morrissey, while a 
member of Congress, had a percentage in the game of faro 
at Washington, His indictment of Morrissey, in the public 
press, wound up as follows: 

"Another charge against Morrissey is that he managed through a 
•willing Judge (George G. Barnard) late at night, to be appointed Re- 
ceiver of a lottery business worth at least half a million of dollars. The 



:M THIRtY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITIC^. 

following mcfrning early he sold out to a friend for twenty-five thousand 
dollars, on an understanding that he should be interested. I know of 
nothing since the time when Fisk used to parade his mistress at water- 
ing-places and through the public streets, when Judges sat in his box 
at the theatre and at the table of his mistress, that could do more to de- 
stroy virtue in the minds of the young, than the election of John Mor- 
rissey from one of the most respectable, literary and high-toned dis- 
tricts in the City." 

Regarding Townsend's charges Morrissej stated to a 
newspaper reporter : 

"Well, that's the old story, you know. They have printed such 
things every time I have been a candidate for office. If I had my life 
to live over again, I would change a good many things. But no one — 
not even Tweed, who hates me, — ever accused me of being a thief. I 
was a wild young fellow, and as a young man I have been in a good 
many wild scrapes that I am sorry for ; but I never stole anything, and 
no man will ever say I broke my word. I wouldn't take ' a certificate 
of election' from any otheV Senatorial District in the City, at this time, 
than the one I am running in. I wanted to run in John Kelly's dis- 
trict, if I ran at all, and to let the people of that district say, squarely, 
whether they were in favor of a man who had honestly tried, in the last 
Legislature, to stop the squandering of their money — of a man who 
voted for all Reform measures in the last Legislature, or in favor of 
John Kelly, who, as the leader of Tammany Hall, did his best to defeat 
every single one of them." 

The result was another tritimph for Morrissey, showing a 
majority of 3,874: over Augustus Schell. But from the 
exertions incident to the canvass he never rallied ; his al- 
ready shattered health became more and more impaired ; 
and by the advice of his physicians he sought a Southern 
climate, in the hope of recuperating. He was of cotirse un- 
able to take his seat in the Senate chamber, and spent the 
Winter in Florida ; but, not improving in condition as he 
had expected, he started for New York on March 28, 18*? 8. 
He caught a severe cold on the voyage home, from Avhich 
he never recovered. On April 19 he was removed to 
Saratoga, where he seemed to improve, and he felt sure he 
would soon be able to take his seat in the Legislature, but, 
on April 29, his right arm became paralyzed and he lost 



TRIBUTEIS of RtSI'P^cT TO JOHN MOUllISSEV. r>:i'J 

the power of speech ; but this Avas restored in a few hours. 
The next day, all hope of his recovery was abandoned. lie 
said : " I am running neck and neck with Death, and rapidly 
tiriiiij.'" From that time he remained in a semi-conscious 
condition till the hour of his demise. 

The deatli of Morrissey was announced to the Senate 
by Lieut. -Gov. Dorsheimer, the })residing otHcer, on the 
evening of ^fay 1, when Senator Harris (Kcpublican), of 
Albany, in proposing the appointment of a committee 
to draw up a memorial and resolutions respecting the 
deceased, said that the vacant chair of the dead man had 
constantly reminded his brother Senators throughout the 
Winter of the terrible struggle he was making against 
death, and had excited their pity and sympathy. Senator 
Harris added in conclusion : 

" The deceased was every inch a man. His marked characteristic 
was his great courage. It is doubtful whether such boldness and dar- 
ing in political annals were ever shown as were displayed by him in 
his last canvass in New York. Let us place on record an evidence of 
our estimation of a brave man and a respected associate." 

In the Senate chamber on May 2, the desk and empty 
chair of the deceased Senator were draped with black 
crape, and upon the desk there rested a pyramid of white 
roses, lilies and spring flowers, and a large floral cross, a 
tribute from the Gray Nuns, whose cause Morrissey had 
championed during his first year in the Legislature. 

Among other resolutions reported to and adopted by the 
Senate was the following : 

Resolved, That we desire to certify our respect for the remarkable 
qualities of the deceased — for his individuality of character, for his 
great moral courage, for his devotion to principle and to his friends, 
for his persistent energy, which marked his life-long struggle against 
formidable obstacles, and, above all, for his rare and unquestioned in- 
tegrity. 

Eulogies on the deceased were delivered by Senators 
Harris, Jacobs, McCarthy, Wagner, Pomeroy, Eccleeine an<I 



S40 THiRf T TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

others. Senator Pomeroy (Republican), among other kindly 
allusions to the deceased, said the recollections of his past 
life were obliterated by the high- toned and efficient manner 
in which he conducted himself during his legislative career. 
Senator McCarthy (Republican) said : 

" To know the deceased was to respect and love him. He had few 
superiors in plain common sense. IIow sweet to feel we can inscribe 
on the tablets of time : ' Here lies an honest man, who had power to 
raise himself above circumstances and perform all duties faithfully.' " 

Senator Thomas C. E. Ecclesine (Democrat,) of New 
York City, spoke as follows : 

"It is not my purpose to add any lengthy eulogy to the words of 
sorrow and sympathy that have been pronounced on the occasion of 
the death of Senator Morrissey. Simple and natural as the man himself, 
wliose death has filled this chamber with grief, simple and natural 
and without any effort shall be the few words that I shall offer as a 
tribute to his memory. I do not care here to rehearse the political 
victories he has attained. He won them all by hard and vigorous 
fighting, and owing mainly to the witchery of his own personal 
individuality. He was placed in a position in life where all the cir- 
cumstances were unpropitious to success, but he had a vigor of puipose 
with a manliness of soul and kiadliness of heart that endeared him to 
those who knew him, and won for him, from hard fate, the glories and 
honors he attained. But if he had won naught but these, glorious and 
honorable as they are, his life record would have been poor indeed. 
But there are other honors that are not chanted and do not become 
parts of the page of history. There are other victories won in the 
hearts of the poor and helpless and oppressed ; there are chaplets that 
the loving hands of widows' gentle touch have sanctified more than 
any that adorn the brow of statesmen. There are chaplets of the 
poor, whom he never forsook, the oppressed, for whom he was always 
kindly disposed, and those who needed charity for Avhom his generous 
purse was always open — these will lay their tributes of respect upon his 
grave. John Morrissey had naturally a large and capacious intellect, 
but he had a larger, brighter and warmer heart. Many and many a 
story of want relieved, desolation soothed, and misery rescued, will be 
told of him when other memories will bo faded and forgotten. He is 
dead. It is the common heritage of the sons of men. He has gone to 
that land of shadows, toward which we are hastening ; but he has 
gone, buoyed up and soothed by the hopes of a blessed immortality. 



TN ME.MOHV OF TIIF, DECEASED SENATOR. r.4l 

hopes that lift the ihirk pull, from the portals of the tomb, mb the 
grave of its victory, and death of its stiug. And while, in the language 
of the old Latin poet, we may vsay 'sit tenui tii-i levis,' ' ^luy the 
earth lie light on his body ' we may also add the words of that Church 
in whose faith he died, ' May Heaven have mercy on his soul.' 

i;ri<;litcr, fairer, far than liviii-;, 

Willi no trace of woe or pain ; 
Robed In everlaeling beauty, 

Shall we see thee once again ? 
By the lijjht that never fadeth, 

I'nderneath eterual skies, 
Wlun the diiwn of resurrection 

Breaks o'er deathless Paradise." 

The popular brancli of the Legislature, the Assembly, 
also adopted resolutions, expressing deep regret at the loss 
of Senator Morrissey, and among others, Assemhlyinan 
Fitzgerald (now Supreme Court Judge) and Dr. I. I. Ila^'es, 
the Arctic explorer, then a member of Assembly, eulogized 
his manly characteristics, and spoke of the high esteem in 
which he was held by all who knew him. Fitzgerald, who 
represented an Assembly District in Morrissey's Senatorial 
District, said : 

" No lengthy eulogy is needed to endear the memory of the deceased 
to all his constituents. The lesson of his life is one of innate strength 
of character triumphing over all obstacles and accidents Only a few 
mouths ago the strong man whom we are now called upon to mourn, 
achieved his last and greatest political triumph. To-day the vacant 
chair in the Senate chamber is decorated with flowers, sadly reminding 
us that ' Death rides in every passing breeze and lurks in every flower.' 
Uncompromising honesty, a generous heart, and an open, manly hand, 
were the weapons with which Morrissey distanced many more favored 
competitors in the race of life." 

Dr. Hayes, a leading Republican member of the Assem- 
bly, spoke as follows : 

" I scarcely know what tribute to pay to the distinguished dead. He 
was distinguished beyond mo.st men because the occasion and develop- 
ment of his distinction abideil within himself. Yet he was not a self- 
made man, but a God-made man ; for all that he did was in a manly way 
that God put in him. He often spoke of his faults. A\'e rarely perceived 
them, because his merits compelled our attention. His merits are now 
perceived in the home to which he has gone, and his faults (less than 



542 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

those of most of us) are purged away by the long suffering he endured, 
and gilded over with the many benevolences of his most kindly heart." 

Assemblymen Thomas F. Grady, James Daly and Erastus 
Brooks (Democratic members of the House) also delivered 
brief eulogies, and ex-Governor Alvord, who occupied the 
Speaker's chair, declared the House adjourned, in accord- 
ance with the usual custom in such cases. 

Lieut.-Governor Dorsheimer and Senators Harris, Jacobs, 
Eobertson, St. John, Pomeroy, Hughes, Wagner, Ecclesine 
and Wagstaff acted as pall-bearers at the funeral of the de- 
ceased Senator. 

The New York Tribune (Republican) of May 3, 1878, 
made the following comment on the death of John 
Morrissey : 

"If anywhere a glowing eulogy could be pronounced upon the char- 
acter of John Morrissey, it would be in the Legislature, where he always 
kept his hands clean and bore himself modestly. All the resources of 
the language have been so often exhausted in praise of men who were 
secretly corrupt and wicked in public life as well as in private, that few 
will grudge the kind words which were bestowed yesterday at Albany 
upon the memory of the gambler member, who never was even sus- 
pected of taking a bribe." 



LETTER XLIIt. 

.-(ix-MiLLioN Civil Suit Against Tvvkkd— Critical Condition 
ov THE Pkoplk's Legal Ciiamimon— Ciiaulks O'Conok's 
Reported Death Causes Courts to Adjourn— The Civil 
Suit Progresses, and Its Satisfactory Condition Elates 
Both Tweed and His Counsel — But O'Conor's Unex- 
pected Appearance From His Sick Chamber Causes Con- 
sternation—His Ghostlike Aspect in Court— Counsel 
FOR THE Defence Astounded— Greeted by Peckham 
AND Carter, his Associates— O'Conor's Extraordinary 
Demand and Success— Tweed Foresees His Doom and 
Makes Preparations for Flight— A Suggestion for 
Members of the New York Bar. 

My dear Dean: 

After Tweed's escape from Ludlow street jail, on Decern" 
ber 4th, 1875, his whereabouts was a matter of the wildest 
speculation. The criminal part of the play was over, for 
he had served out his term in the Penitentiary, which had 
been shortened from twelve years to one by the Court of 
Appeals, as related in a preceding letter, and the only thing 
he had to fear now was a judgment in the civil suit for six 
million dollars, under which judgment he could be kept 
incarcerated in the County jail probably for the rest of his 
life. It was while this suit was being pressed in the 
Supreme Court that he made his escape. If the judgment 
was in his favor he could return to the City and be a free 
man, but if against him, he did not propose to be imprisoned 
for life in a civil action. The action was brought on for 
trial at a term of the Supreme Court, before Justice West- 
brook, a country Judge who was regarded as favorable 
to the Ring. In the Legislature of 1882 an effort was 
made to bring Articles of Impeachment against Judge 

543 



J>^ 



V 



B44 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

{ 

i Westbrook for corrupt practices, tlie movement being 
headed by Assemblyman Tlieodore F. Koosevelt, the pres- 
^1*^ ent Governor of the State and the hero of San Juan. But 
1^. the initiatory step was defeated by a majority vote in 
the Assembly, and the matter was abandoned. Before the 
Six-million-dollar action against Tweed was brought to trial, 
the leading Counsel for the people, Charles O'Conor, was 
stricken down in a bed of sickness. The Tweed side, seeing 
an advantage in this, for O'Conor was regarded a^ invincible 
in Court, pressed the case for trial, thus leaving the manage- 
ment of the trial on behalf of the people in the hands of 
O'Conors junior assistants, James C. Carter and Wheeler 
H. Peckham. On the other hand, fearing the loss of 
O'Conor at the trial, the friends of good government be- 
came alarmed. O'Conor was not only seriously ill, but his 
life was despaired of. The most intense interest w^as 
centered in the chances of his recovery. Without his 
masterful hand it was believed that through the ability of 
Tweed's leading counsel, David Dudley Field, the big case 
would be dismissed by Judge Westbrook or a verdict of the 
Jury rendered in favor of the defendant, and that in a few 
days Tweed would return, not only free, but partly vindi- 
cated in the public mind, and that, because of his popularity 
— which, strange to say, had not yet left him — and his 
wonderful magnetism, he would soon be able to restore 
his shattered political fortunes. Therefore, all seemed to 
depend upon O'Conor. 'No great man's sick bed was ever 
watched with more anxiety. Newspaper reporters sur- 
rounded his residence, at Fort Washington on the outskirts 
of the City, and lived in that neighborhood day and night 
watching the crisis of his ailment. Had he been some 
prince or potentate whose death affected the succession to a 
throne, there could not have been more universal commo- 
tion. Bulletins from the eminent physicians constantly at 
his bedside announced almost hourly his condition. Every 



CHARLES O'CONOK'S BATTLE WITH DEATH. 515 

newspaper in the City IkkI spoeinl luilletins posted Heveral 
times a d;iy, before which eai^er crowds leathered to learn 
the news of the ^reat hiwyer's chances. Tiie case went on 
and Tweed, it was said, was concealed in the Palisades of 
Xew Jersey, dressed as a wood-chopper and living in this 
disguise in the hut of a laborer and apparently working 
every day as a hired man. Eagerly every morning did 
Tweed read the newspapers brought to him by his faithful 
friend and boss laborer, and news was conveyed to him by 
Field that the case had taken such a shape that it must be 
surely dismissed, 

O'Conor's condition was pronounced hopeless by his 
physicians. His age, he being now 71 years, told against 
him, and it was conceded that he was sinking. Believing 
that he would not live to see the dawn of November 30, 
several newspapers that morning published long obituaries 
of him. Some of the Courts adjourned out of respect to 
his memory, speeches eulogistic of the suppooed dead leader 
of the Bar being made by prominent lawyers in moving the 
adjournment. O'Couor himself, all the time quite con- 
scious, felt that if he must die, he would (as he stated him- 
self) " die in peace,'' peremptorily refused to take anymore 
medicine and dismissed his physicians. During the night 
he sucked an orange and began to get relief. Next day, 
instead of being dead, he was much better, and inside of a 
few weeks his iron will brought him out of bed, and his 
slow convalescence began. 

While O'Conor was thus battling with death at Fort 
Washington, Tweed's counsel were strenuously urging the 
case to trial, naturally anxious that their client should face his 
crisis during O'Conor's absence and disability. On February 
7, 1876, the trial began ; O'Conor being still confined to his 
room. On the day that Richard O'Gorman, former Corpora- 
tion Counsel, was called to testify, I attended the great 
trial. The Court room was crowded to excess, and I took 



546 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

a seat at tlie back of the Clerk's desk on a projection of tlie 
bench underneath, in j back to the Judge overhead, and my 
face toward the audience. From my position I commanded 
a full view of the entrance. 

David Dudley Field, assisted by his son Dudley Field, 
was in the act of examining a witness. His caution was 
evident at every step ; he sometimes put half of a question, 
came back, consulted with his son, and instead of finishing 
the question withdrew it entirely. He was so careful, so 
watchful, so stealthy in his movements that that great old 
lawyer seemed, figuratively speaking, to be walking on 
eggs. 

He was closely watched by Carter and ^eckham for the 
people, but one could see buoyancy and triumph in the 
whole attitude of David Dudley Field. His anticipated 
triumph could not be concealed, and his son was wearing a 
smile of perfect confidence. While he was about to ask 
another question of the witness, a sudden commotion ap- 
peared at the entrance of the Court room. The Court 
officers were making way for somebody, the chairs were 
moved about, and with the shuflling of feet some noise was 
created. Mr. Field halted in his question, and turned 
round. Then I saw the tall form of Charles O'Conor, pale, 
emaciated and feeble-looking, with the collar of his great 
coat raised about his neck, slowly and painfully walking 
forward towards the Bench. Almost every man in the Court 
room rose to his feet but maintained a respectful silence. 
He approached still further, and his junior assistants Carter 
and Peckham went towards him, and greeted him in 
surprise and delight, Nor was Field long behind them. 
With magnificent courtesy he congratulated his old associ- 
ate at the Bar on his recovery — a recovery which was to 
consign his client to perpetual imprisonment. Then the 
Judge came forward and shook O'Conor's hand and ex- 
pressed delight at his wonderful escape from death. The 




Kedrawn from Harper's Weekly. Hy permission. CopyrlKlit. issl. Iiy Harpei- A: Itrotliers.i 



Charf.es O'Conor's unexpected and gliost-like ai)[)eai'anc'e, 

from his sick cliamber, startles tlic Coni-t at the 

TwKEij trial. 



THE PEUPLES CHAMPION IN COURT. 547 

trial was again ivsiiiiie<l and O'Conor, still wearing his 
great coat altliongh the room was warm and stitling, sat 
down beside his associates, while Field, now more cautious 
and less confident than before so far as one could judge 
from his api)carance, proceeded to question his witness. 
While this was going on both of O'Conor's associates kept 
whispering to him. I sat within a few feet of them, 
(lin,M'tly facing them. O'Conor said only a few words in 
replv to their remarks, llfs face was drawn, his complexion 
siiUow, his lips dry and parched, and he occasionally mois- 
c'lH'd them with his tongue. At length, apparently irritated 
at the whispering of his juniors, he deliberately rose, took 
his chair and, ])lacing it a few feet away from them, sat 
down and listened intently to the questions and to the 
answers of the witness. Ten minutes did not elapse when 
he rose and said : *' If your Honor please." This was enough. 
Field knew what was coming, and sat down. O'Conor 
slowly, and with the aid of some one near him, took off his 
great coat and began to speak, his words being drawn out 
and his manner extremely painful to witness. I recollect 
his first words. 

"This morning, your Honor, I read in one of this day's papers, in 
my bedroom to which I have been contined for some time with sick- 
ness, the testimony given yesterday for the defence in this case. I do 
not come hero to find fault with anybody, but, your Honor, that testi- 
mony was wholly irrelevant, and not one word of ilorof Mr. C)'Gorm:in's 
testimony which I have heard to-day should have been admitted." 

Then simply, plainly, logically, he pointed out to the 
Court that the object and the only object of the testimony 
objected to was to divert the minds of the Jury from the 
real issue in the case. Let me briefly explain the point in- 
volved. After the conclusive proofs of the Ring s rascality 
had been published in the Times ; after the Conunittee of 
Seventy had threatened prosecution ; and after Tweed had 
resigned his office as Commissioner of Public Works, the 
Corporation Counsel (doubtless at the instance of Twee4 



548 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and his confederates) in order to show good faith on the 
part of the remaining city othcials, commenced an action 
on behalf of the Major, Aldermen and Commonalty of the 
City, against Tweed and others to recover the money al- 
leged to have been fraudnlentlj abstracted from the Treas- 
ury, hoping thereby to anticipate, or rather perhaps, check- 
mate, any action intended to be instituted at the instance of 
the Committee of Seventy. Bnt the able men behind the 
popular movement, led by O'Couor, Tilden and Evarts, 
were not to be caught napping, and they applied to, and 
induced, the Attorney General of the State to appoint Mr. 
O'Conor a Special Deputy Attorney General for the pur- 
pose of prosecuting actions against Tweed and his confeder- 
ates on behalf of the People of the State of New York. 

Accordingly such an action was brought and thus two 
actions, one by the State and the other by the City, were 
being prosecuted at the same time against Tweed. The 
Tweed lawyers assailed the action taken on behalf of the 
State, mainly upon the ground that the money alleged to 
have been stolen was the property ol the City, and not of 
the State, and instituted proceedings to have the latter action 
discontinued. After going through the various stages of 
litigation in the lower Courts, the proceedings to compel a 
discontinuance reached the Court of xippeals for final de- 
cision and, to the surprise of the lawyers for the people, 
that Court decided that the action by the State was un- 
authorized and must be discontinued. The action by the 
People of the State therefore was formally discontinued, 
and Tweed and his confreres were jubilant. But in reality 
they had little reason to be. The counsel for the People, 
led by Mr. O'Conor, feeling that justice would not be done 
in the action brought in behalf of the City, by the Corpora- 
tion Counsel— in other words that action was regarded as a 
mere device to serve Tweed — determined that they should 
not be outflanked. So during the session of the Legisla- 



O'CONOR'S CONVINCING ARGUMENT. 549 

tare of 1872, Mr. Tildon, wlio became a member of the 
Assembly for the special purpose of passing reform legisla- 
tion, pushed through a bill providing that the people of the 
State might maintain such an action, notwithstanding that 
the City had already begun an action for the same purpose. 
The ne\A' action, which was commenced under the provi- 
sicms of this statute, was that which was being tried wlien 
Mv. O'Conor made his appearance in Court, as described in 
the early ]>art of this letter. The testimony of Mr. O'Gor- 
mau, alluded to by Mr. O'Conor, was to the etiect that the 
action In-ought against Tweed on behalf of the City was in 
good faith, and to that end he had employed ex-Judge John 
K. Porter and other lawyers to assist him. 

These associate counsel were some of the foremost law- 
yers in the City, men of reputation for public spirit and 
integrity second to none, and were retained doubtless so as 
to act as a counterweight to the " tone " and respectability 
of the counsel for the People. 

Mr. O'Conor demonstrated that the question of good or 
bad faith of the action on behalf of the City had no bear- 
ing on the case before the Court, which was being con- 
ducted under the authority of the statute, and moved to 
strike out all the testimony on that subject. When Mr. 
O'Conor, plainly exhausted even by the exertion of this 
brief argument, sat down, David Dudley Pield arose in full 
lighting trim. He first proceeded to show that the law 
under which the present action was brought was specially 
enacted by Tweed's enemies to accomplish designs for his 
overthrow; that the legislative authority was invoked not for 
general purposes, as the Constitution provides, but for the 
special purpose of one man's destruction, political and 
social. Then Mr. Field, with almost fierce emphasis, 
exclaimed : 

" Fifty years from now men will stand amazed that a system of 
legal procedure was specially devised to meet the case of one individual. 



550 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

This law should be branded as trifling with the dignity and grandeur of 
our Judicature, which was established for the wliole people. But, 
upon the strict rules of legal procedure and well-established principles 
governing tlie trial of causes, the motion of the distinguished counsel 
for Municipal Reform (Mr. O'Conor) cannot be entertained. The evi- 
dence was offered and accepted without objection and most of it 
had been on the record for two days. The Court accepted it without 
objection or question. The distinguished associates of Mr. O'Conor, 
who have had charge of the trial for the people, accepted the issue 
based on that evidence ; they think they are correct in their views. 
Kow comes forward one of their associates, who differs from them on 
this point, and asks that the testimony to the admission of which they 
have substantially consented, be stricken from the record. 

"This Is such a novel and, I might add, revolutionary suggestion, 
that the distinguished counsel himself must admit that it cannot safely 
be given the sanction of a Court of law, and that such a proceeding, so 
subversive of regularity, cannot be established as the rule of law 
governing the Courts." 

During this and more of this line of argument, Mr. Field's 
manner and attitude was one of defiance, and he resumed 
his seat with an air of absolute confidence that Mr. 
O' Conor's motion could not prevail. 

O'Conor immediately arose and seemed for a moment to 
throw off the signs of languor manifest when he sat down 
at the close of his first argument. He was on his mettle, 
and began with cutting emphasis : 

"I am asked, indeed asked almost in the nature of a challenge, if I 
must not admit the soundness of the propositions enunciated by 
the distinguished covmsel for the defendant. Why, your Honor, such 
propositions never were the law, are not now the law, and never can 
be the law, or the practice, where law is intelligently and honestly 
administered. No technicality shall bind public justice. If this 
evidence is here, no matter how it came or who may be responsible for 
it — and in this connection I must say that your Honor is in no 
way responsible, because it was admitted without objection for a 
purpose which is antagonistic to the ends of public justice — and 
your Honor believes it to be such, more especially as it is wholly irrele- 
vant, it is the duty of the Court, at any stage of the case, to strike 
it from the record. There is no doubt of your Honor's legal powers to 
do so. The question is purely one of discretion on the part of the 
Court. Shall it be said that this public malefactor shall be permitted 



GREAT TRIUMPH OF THE VENEKAULK JLIKIST. nni 

to steal $6,000,000 of the people's money and retain it because a Judge 
is hampered by a mere techuicality? No, sir ! Tlie Judge, the 
Kworii servant of the people, rises above all teclinieulities in the cause 
of public justice, and will brush aside small obstacles which may 
stand in the way of recoveriui; back to the people the property which 
has been feloniously lilched from them." 

He sat dowD, but it was easy to see that liis argument 
and Ills manner of delivering it, cold, severe, rasping and 
aggressive, had liguratively lifted the Judge from his seat. 
He was completely in O'Conor's grasp, and with a few ex- 
planatory words decided that he would strike out the evi- 
dence. Not expecting that the Judge M'ould decide so 
promptly, Mr. Field started to his feet, saying : " Before 
you decide, your Honor, I wish to be heard further.'' He 
was heard further, and at length, but it was of no avail. 
The Judge struck out the testimony of several distinguished 
witnesses, including that of Mr. O' Gorman and John K. 
Porter, and the trial proceeded under new auspices. 

Tweed, in the meantime, was carrying on his avocation as 
laborer in the Jersey Palisades, but when, the next morning, 
he read in the newspapers that O'Conor had appeared in 
Court, the Boss read his doom, accepted it as such, and 
without further delay began his preparations to flee the 
country. This unconscious tribute of Tweed to the power 
of O'Conor was justified by the sequel. The case now went 
on day after day with O'Conor at the helm, until on the 9th 
of March, 1876, the jury brought in a verdict against Tweed 
for over $6,000,000. 

For all the splendid services rendered during these years, 
to perform which he had come forth from his retirement at 
ai) old age, having many years previously withdrawn from 
the field of practice, Charles O'Conor declined to accept 
any compensation whatever. He was the master-spirit that 
guided the criminal as well as civil proceedings against the 
Ring ; he, more than any other man, had contributed to 
their downfall, disgrace and punishment ; he had recovered 



S52 



THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 



a judgment of $0,000,000 for the City against Tweed, tlie 
moral effect of which was to frighten another public plun- 
derer into making restitution to the city of $400,000. 

And all this was done without ambition other than the 
noble ambition to benefit his fellow citizens and purify the 
management of political affairs. Unlike Mr. Tilden, he had 
no political axes to grind, no revenges to gratify. 

Yet, strange to say, no monument stands in our city to 
commemorate the superb public services of Charles O'Conor, 
or impress upon the rising generation the lesson of his 
patriotism and worth. 

Soon after his triumphs he retired permanently to Nan- 
• tucket, a beautiful Island situated in the Atlantic Ocean, 
about twenty-five miles from the mainland, off the coast of 
Massachusetts, on which he had constructed a magnificent 
residence. His wife having died many years before, leavmg 
no children, here he spent, almost in entire seclusion, the 
remaining portion of his life. He died on the twelfth day 
of May, 1884:, having passed the eightieth year of his age. 



LETTER XLIY. 

Tweed Faces His Twelve Years' Sentence in the Peni- 
tentiary — His Stranue Hold on the Affections ok 
THE Masses — The Court of Appeals Comes to His Re- 
lief—Release Followed by Re-Arrest— Tweed's Es- 
cape While in Charc.e of Sheriff's Officers— Hides 
in the Palisades, Disguised as a Woodchopper — His 
Flight, Capture and Return to Ludlow Street Jail — 
Pathetic Appeal to His Prosecutors — His Last Des- 
perate Effort to Secure Freedom — Offers to Surren- 
der and Tell Everything — All Hope Gone, He Dies 
Broken-Hearted, and is Buried in Greenwood Ceme- 
tery. 

My dear Dean : 

After Tweed was taken into the Chambers of the Su- 
preme Court, the day of his sentence, as related in a pre- 
ceding letter, he was a pitiable sight, '^riie dreadful words 
of condemnation which fell with such emphasis and force 
from the lips of Judge Davis, and the still more dreadful 
sentence of twelve years, which, considering his age, was 
ecpiivalent to imprisonment for life, had such a crushing 
effect upon him, that he appeared to be dazed. lie was 
taken to the Sheriff's private office, to await the making 
out of the commitments by Chief Clerk Sparks, while his 
lawyers were making out papers in the vain hope of pro- 
curing a stay from some Judge. They applied to several 
Judges, including Judge Pratt, of Brooklyn, and Judge 
Ingraham, of this City, and all to no avail. The night 
grew on, but still a \ ast crowd remained around the Court 
House. An effort was made to disperse it by a ruse. A 
man was led out of the Court House and hustled into a 

553 



554 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

carriage, while somebody in the scheme loudly cried out : 
" There goes Tweed ! " and the carriage drove quickly 
away. The Court room doors were then closed, to further 
indicate that Tweed had been taken away. A large major- 
ity of the crowd, however, remained and watched every 
approach from the Court House, still evidently believing 
that Tweed was inside. 

Long after the commitments were in the hands of the 
Sheriff, the prisoner was kept in the private office of that 
functionary. He was weak and exhausted, and lay on a 
couch. Those in the room talked in whispers, while the 
fallen potentate closed his eyes in apparent plumber. The 
midnight hour chimed out from the bells of Trinity 
Church, but still no stay. Yet they lingered in hope. 
Tweed's son, General William M. Tweed, Jr., went several 
times out of the room, where his father was resting, through 
one of the lower windows, going over to Delmonico's, corner 
of Chambers street and Broadway, to learn news from the 
lawyers, who were to report there when a stay was had, 
and always returning with a dejected countenance. Thus 
did they linger and wait, all night, until five o'clock in the 
morning. Abandoning all further hope, Tweed arose from 
the lounge to go to the prison. Il^ot with standing the hour, 
the crowd still remained outside, during that Winter's 
night. Tweed was taken up stairs and conveyed to the 
main entrance, on Chambers street, walked down the mar- 
ble steps, leaning on the arm of his son, entered a cari'iage 
with the Sheriff's officers, and was driven to the Tombs, 
outside of which a large crowd was waiting to get a last 
glimpse of the fallen potentate. 

Whatever may have been the transgressions of Tweed, 
and they were many, it is not to be denied that he had a 
strong hold on the affections of the masses. In that early 
dawn stood hundreds of people who kept vigil the live long 
night, not from idle curiosity, but to pay a tribute of 



SYMPATHY OF THE I'KOl'LK Ft)K TWEED. 555 

friendship and devotion to liim in (ho hour of his aftliction. 
A man who stood in their midst, one George Middleton, 
who kept a liquor sahjon at Leonard and Centre streets, 
whom almost everybody knew in that j)art of the City, ex- 
pressed the general sentiment of the crow<I, who endorsed 
his words, when he said : " The majority of people with 
whom I talked believe that the prosecutors of Tweed did 
wrong ; for they fooled the Jury into the notion that 
Tweed could only get one year under the verdict they gave. 
Does anyone think that the Jury meant to give Judge 
Davis power to send him to prison for over a hundred 
years ; as he could, from the way the prosecution and the 
Judge looked at it. I heard John Graham's argument, and 
you bet he is right, that the Jury only intended one year 
for Tweed. I'll bet a hundred dollars to ten, that the 
higher Courts won't stand for it." George Middleton was 
right. The Court of Appeals afterwards cut down Tweed's 
sentence to one year, as the maximum limit. 

" No doubt that he will break down under the disg-race,'' 
continued Middleton ; " although he is as brave as they 
make 'em ; but the law is a terror when it takes a hold of a 
man, no matter who he is. Men who fawned upon the 
Boss in the days of his power are now afraid to speak to 
him. Why, only the very day the Jury brought in the 
verdict, I saw Tweed ask John Ballington, the chief officer, 
who holds that position and every position he. ever had 
from him, for a glass of water, and Ballington pretended 
not to hear him ; he was too much afraid of the Reformers 
to show Tweed even common kindness, Charley Devlin, 
like a man, went on his bond, and John Morrissey, who 
had not spoken to Tweed in years, on account of politics, 
went to the District Attorney, and said he would go on the 
old man's bond. Tweed has thousands among the poor to- 
day, who bless him. He kept the poor employed, and 
they would have done anything for him." 



556 



THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 



This utterance was warmly approved by those who 
listened. What a strange condition of society ! Here was 
a man who, it was positively proven, had stolen a million of 
dollars of the people's money, and who let others steal nntil 
at least six millions of dollars were feloniously abstracted 
from the public treasury, now, when condign punishment 
had overtaken him, exciting sympathy as if he had been a 
martyr in the cause of humanity. 

Criminal as he was, Tweed was treated with every con- 
sideration by the prison authorities. While in the Tombs, 
he was allowed to see his friends, and given other privi- 
leges, that showed the undercurrent of sympathy which ran 
even in the hearts of his keepers for the man who had so 
suddenly fallen and fallen from so great a height. The 
cell assigned to Tweed had none of the features associated 
with the idea of prison life. It was not, in fact, a cell at 
all, but a room furnished with more than ordinary com- 
forts. 

When he had served twelve months on Blackwell's 
Island, Tweed paid a fine of $250, in accordance with the 
contention of his counsel that his legal term of imprison- 
ment had expired. The Court of Appeals, however, not 
having yet passed upon this point, he was held, until 
liberated under the decision that the cumulative sentence 
of twelve years imposed by Judge Noah Davis was illegal. 

Immediately upon his release from the Island, Tweed 
was arrested under a Civil suit for $6,000,000, brought 
under the provisions of a special Act referred to in a preced- 
ing letter, and was taken by the Sheriff directly from the 
Penitentiary and lodged in the County jail, located in Lud- 
low street. Of this legal proceeding and its result, I have 
also spoken in a previous letter. 

On the evening of December 4, 1875, the City was 
startled by the news of Tweed's escape from Ludlow street 
jail. His life there had been a mystery. It is said that 



KscApr: OF THE Ross FRo^r custody. ss? 

lit- had been frequently driven out in a closed carriage, was 
taken sometimes to the theatre, and was allowed to dine 
with liis own family in his house, in Madison avenue, sev- 
eral times every week. While on a visit to liis house, 
on the evening of December 4, under charge of AVarden 
Dunham and Keeper Hagan of Ludlow street jail, he 
escaped, about twenty minutes before 7 p. m. In a state of 
extreme excitement, Dunham made the announcement to 
Capt. Mount, at Fifty-ninth street Police Station, at 7 p.m. 
An alarm was at once sent to the Central Office, and an 
immediate search of Tweed's house was })rocceded with. 
On the arrival of the Inspector and Capt. Mount at 
Tweed's liouso, tliey found it brilliantly lighted, a most im- 
nsual thing, as if inviting inspection. In his account of the 
occurrence, Dunham tells the following story : 

"At one o'clock, Mr. Tweed and son, Wm. M. Jr., myself and Ed. 
Hagan, a keeper in the jail, started for a drive. We drove to Kings- 
bridge Road, and thence through the Boulevard to Central Park. We 
stepped out of the carriage when on the Western side of the Park, and 
walked for about fifteen minutes. Entering the carriage, we then dro^e 
to Mr. Tweed's house, where he sat down in the front parlor. A few 
minutes afterwards, Mr. Tweed said he would go up stairs and see his 
wife for a moment. As he went out of the room, Ilagan went into the 
hall and entered a room to wash his hands. About five minutes after- 
wards, looking at my watch, I told his son William' it was time to go, 
and that he had better call his father. He went upstairs and returned in 
a few minutes, saying his father was not there. Hagan went upstairs at 
once, and I went to the front door and looked up and down the street, 
and into the area. Our carriage was where we had left it. Re-entering 
the house, I saw Mrs. Tweed standing at the head of the stairs. I asked 
her if Mr. Tweed was upstairs, and she said she had not seen him. 
Hagan and I then searched the house thoroughly. Satisfied that Tweed 
was not there, Hagan and I drove to Fifty-ninth street Police Station, 
where we asked the Sergeant to sound a general alarm, and I then went 
to the Central Office and told Inspector Dilke of the escape, it was 
about 6.20 o'clock when the escape was made." 

Dunham said further that he had taken Tweed out to 
drive three times before, and that, about a week previously, 



558 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

they and Justice Timothy J. Campbell visited the Clare- 
mont Hotel on 123d Street and 11th Avenue. The Warden 
said it was customary to allow prisoners committed on civil 
process to go out of jail occasionally, accompanied by officers. 
Plagan, the keeper who veas with Tweed and Dunham, gave 
substantially the same evidence. A reward of $10,000 was 
then offered by Sheriff Conner for Tweed's capture. 

Search was made in every direction, but no clue was 
found to the whereabouts of the missing man. Many 
theories were of course propounded by the newspapers and 
the Police authorities, as to the mode of the escape and 
the exact time at which it was made ; no two of which were 
alike. The prevailing opinion, however, was that Dunham 
was in the secret; and that this was the opinion of his 
official superiors is shown from the fact that he was sus- 
pended a few days afterwards. 

The Police President, Superintendent, and Inspector 
Thorne believed that Tweed had gone for hours before his 
escape was reported. The fact that no trace of him could 
be found seemed to corroborate this view. His appearance 
was too well-known to admit of his leaving the city by 
land without being detected. All outgoing vessels of every 
description were closely searched without any result. If 
he did escape by water he must have gone down the bay 
on some harbor craft which transferred him to his ship on 
the sea. 

The public was naturally excited, and the new^spaper re- 
porters were most industrious in devising theories in ex- 
planation of the escape and concealment of a man whose 
appearance was so well-known. Never was the course of 
a comet more erratic or more mysterious. Even the bait 
of $10,000 reward failed in eliciting a clue. In the absence 
of trustworthy information, comedy and burlesque came 
into play. It was reported in the gravest manner, with the 
most touching minuteness, that the ex-Boss had been car 



UNCEUTAINTY KIXiAKDl.NU TWEED'S WllEHEAIiOUTS. 559 

ried off in the closed wagon of a travelling menagerie, like 
one of tiie aninlals^and dropped some two or three hundred 
miles from the city. In the New York Tiraes of Decem- 
ber 2^, he was reported to be in Havana. In the Augusta 
(Ga.) Sentinel of Tuesday, December 21, it was stated that 
Tweed was in Savannah on the previous Thnrsday and P'ri- 
day, and that he afterwards went on board the shi}), City of 
Dallas, for Nassau. Two detectives from New York had, it 
appears, arrived in Savannah on Satnrday, but the " old man " 
was gone. Immediately after the escape it was rumored 
that Tweed had been seen in Brooklyn, that he had gone 
oft' in the British bark Lord Clarendon, which, it was al- 
leged, had been purchased by a friend for the purpose of 
taking him away. Then the Times of January 17th, 18T6, 
with every appearance of seriousness informed the public 
that " according to a local paper, Tweed was in North 
Carolina, the other day, with a body-guard of twelve tierce 
men, armed with knives and pistols. Now, he is reported 
by the Hamilton (Ontario) Spectator to be in Canada, 
clothed in coarse garments and wearing a grey wig and 
green goggles." An elaborate acconnt was given by the 
Spectator of his movements from place to place in this dis- 
guise, showing the inventive genius of the reporter. A 
strict watch was kept in Canada, and along the border, and 
tours of investigation were made throughout the Dominion, 
by rail and sleigh, but without effect. 

Under the heading " A Secret History," the New York 
Times of December 15, 1875, had caused considerabFe com- 
motion in some quarters, by publishing the report that 
Tweed had not fled from this country at all, but was at 
hand, and proposed to offer a compromise of the claims 
against him, and divulge the secrets of the Tammany Ring. 
" He will give up," it said, " the names of all who shared 
in the plunder, and expose the men who worked with him 
and for him in the days of his power, and who turned upon 



560 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

him SO relentlessly after his downfall." The Times sus- 
pected that many persons in brownstone houses and many 
persons bursting with indignation of Tweed's villainy, would 
be implicated. " Could even " it asked, " Mr. Tilden afford 
to have Tweed's story told ? He was Chairman of the State 
Democratic Committee in 1870 and 'Tl, and knew perfectly 
well that enormous amounts of money were being used for 
election purposes. Where did he think it came from ? " 

Notwithstanding the activity of detectives, and the theo- 
ries of the newspapers, as to Tweed's whereabouts, during 
the interval which elapsed between the escape from Ludlow 
street jail, and his departure from the country altogether, 
he was but a short distance away. The story of his wander- 
ino-8 came out afterwards, and in view of the frantic efforts 
made on all sides to secure his arrest, reads like a romance. 
For some days after his escape, he was hidden in New 
Jersey, not far from Weehawken Ferry. Thence he was 
taken to a farm-house, beyond the Palisades, where, having 
shaved off his whiskers, and put on a wig, he took the 
name of John Secor. Here he remained till March, chop- 
ping wood, and doing other light work about the house of 
his entertainer, who played the part of boss. 

During this time, the civil suit for the recovery of the 
$6,000,000 stolen from the city was proceeding, the course 
of which, as reported in the morning papers, he followed 
with acute interest. He was not without strong and well- 
grounded hopes of getting a verdict. He had as his lead- 
ing counsel David Dudley Field, one of the most eminent 
lawyers and advocates in the United States, and as pre- 
siding Judge Justice Westbrooke, who was regarded by 
Tweed as favorable to him. 

Wood chopping behind the Palisades, the ex-Boss and 
the man who kept him faithfully in hiding, despite the 
$10,000 reward he could have earned by his betrayal, Tweed 
watched the issue of events. He had still faith in his star ; 



WHAT J'llUMl'TED THE BOSS TO FLIGHT. 5t5i 

the present eclipse was only temporary ; there was still a 
strong sentiment among certain classes in his favor ; and the 
only man who could make the law really a terror to him, 
and who was able to meet his advocate in C/Ourt, was, it was 
supposed, incapacitated by sickness. That man was Charles 
O'Conor. 

This was the situation, when one morning Tweed saw it an- 
nounced in the papers that O'Conor had appeared in Court. 
]lad O'Conor come back from the grave, he would hardly 
have been more astonished. Tweed was not exactly a 
superstitious man, but this circumstance was so remarkable, 
that it would have struck a chill into the heart of even a 
stouter criminal. He felt that the game was up ; that the 
avenger was on his track as surely as if a Higher Power 
than that of the lawyer had taken the case in hand. In the 
person of O'Conor, who he knew could not be tampered 
with or turned from the path of public duty by any threat 
or inducement, he instinctively perceived the embodiment 
of Justice, and of a sure and speedy retribution. 

O'Conor did not appear in Court until the day after the 
defence had begun, and the case had taken that favorable 
turn which had raised the hopes of Tweed's counsel. Field. 
But the " favorable turn " of which O'Conor had read that 
very morning, in the newspapers, and which was one of the 
causes of his dragging his feeble frame into Court, Tweed 
felt would now soon be reversed. He resolved, therefore, 
to fly at once from the inevitable verdict. Throwing aside his 
ax, he stealthily removed to the hut of a fisherman, in sight 
of the Narrows, with a view of taking the earliest possible 
passage to Spain, or Spanish territory, there being, as he 
knew, no extradition treaty between Spain and the United 
States. Here he remained for over two months, without 
his whereabouts being discovered or even suspected. To 
the poor he had always been friendly, and among them he 
had always found a friend ; and now, when deserted bv 



562 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

those whom liis favors had enriched, a fugitive with a price 
upon his head, he was not deceived in placing his liberty 
in the keeping and at the mercy of an humble fisherman. 
On May 29, 1876, he was taken on board the Frank 
Atwood, a schooner engaged in the fruit trade, and plying 
mainly between New York and the West Indies. The 
Frank Atwood was cleared at the Custom House on the 2Ttli 
of that month, and was generally supposed to have gone to 
the lower bay, where she was kept in waiting for Tweed, 
who was conveyed to her in the fishing-boat of his host of 
the previous two months. In this vessel he sailed to 
Florida, where he was joined by a man calling himself 
Hunt, who was said to have been his New Orleans son-in- 
law, Maginnis. After spending some time in Florida, 
he and Hunt sailed in a fishing smack for Santiago de 
Cuba. But the fisherman, having some doubts about 
the character of his passengers, landed them by night on a 
rock about ten miles from that port. Next morning they 
sighted a Cuban fisherman, who rescued them, and who took 
them to the city. On their passports being demanded and 
produced, and being found not to bear the vise of the Con- 
sul of St. Augustine, Florida, they were promptly arrested 
and imprisoned. They appealed to the American Consul, 
and were released after nearly two months of confinement ; 
after which they hurried on board the Spanish brig Car- 
men, and took passage for Vigo, in Spain. This was on 
July 27, 1876. Meanwhile, Tweed's identity had been 
discovered, but when search was made the brig was 
gone. Hamilton Fish, the then Secretary of State, re- 
quested the Spanish authorities to arrest him on his arrival, 
and, having procured in London a picture of Tweed, the 
commandant of the province boarded the Carmen the mo- 
ment she arrived in port, recognized and arrested him, and 
put him in the fortress prison. When arrested, Tweed 
was disguised as a common sailor, and was engaged in 



TWEED'S CAPTURE AND UETURN TO NEW YORK. .v.:? 

Rcrnhbingj the deck. Soon after, the United States Steamer 
Franklin, whicli had been cruising in the Mediterranean, 
called at Vigo, in pursuance of orders received at Gibraltar, 
and took him to Ts'ew York. The picture from which the 
Spanish commandant recognized Tweed was one of Nast's 
caricatures, taken from Harper's WeeJdy, in which the Boss 
was represented as beating a child, supposed to represent 
American justice. This led the Spanish authorities and 
Spanish reporters to imagine that Tweed had been con- 
cerned in kidnapping children. This idea, when it got 
abroad, caused no small amount of indignation among the 
people of Yigo against the culprit who, but for the pre- 
cautions taken by the commandant for his safety, might 
have suffered a more severe chastisement from the hands 
of the excited populace than he was represented as inflict- 
ing upon the emblematic baby. Hence, in the first official 
announcement in the United States of the arrest of " Twid 
autelme " (which was believed to be a corruption of " Tweed, 
Guilielme, or William ") it was stated that he had been 
arrested for kidnapping American children. 

The process of his transfer from the prison to the 
Franklin was very imposing, so far as the Spanish authori- 
ties had anything to do with it. The High Sheriff with 
two aids, and an aid of the Commandant of the Body, had 
a guard of thirty soldiers. The procession marched down 
to the wharf, with great solemnity, at 10 o'clock, p. m. 
The lateness of the hour, the military escort, the official 
pomp with which the whole affair was conducted, gave a 
weird and impressive aspect to the scene. At the wharf, 
the procession was met by one of the Franklin's boats, 
into which Tweed was transferred, and by 10:30 o'clock he 
was in his berth on the ship. The quarters assigned him 
were furnished with every luxury, but were secured against 
the possibility of his escape or even opportunity of com- 
munication with persons outside. There was a sentry in 



hCA TnlRTY YfiAilS OF NEW tORK POLlWCS. 

liis room, day and night. At the door was an orderly, who 
was constantly on duty, ready to convey messages or render 
assistance. In addition to these guards, the oflicers of the 
ship were especially commissioned to look after the pris- 
oner, and ordered not to lose sight of him for a moment 
while the vessel was in port. Besides this, the executive 
officer of the ship was also an active custodian. One of the 
staterooms connecting with Tweed's saloon was occupied 
by this officer, so that he might be on hand should any- 
thing happen. Every precaution was adopted not only 
against attempt at escape, but against possible attempt at 
suicide. 

When Tweed boarded the ship he was received by the 
Commander of the Franklin, and at once escorted to his 
quarters. The narrator says : 

He was a seedy-looking fellow, I assure you. He wore a soiled 
linen shirt without a collar, a black alpaca coat that sagged in the 
Lack and sides in a most unbecoming manner, a dirty brown vest, and 
a pair of checked trousers. He carried a small handbag, in which were 
some clothes he had purchased at Vigo. The baggage taken from him 
by the Spanish authorities, at the time of his capture, had been put 
under seal and so received by us. The bundles were stored away in a 
room in the ship, and the seals were not broken until we reached New 
York. Every half hour this room was visited by a Corporal, who re- 
ported to the Executive officer that the seals had not been disturbed. 
Tweed's capture did not seem to affect him seriously. In fact, he 
seemed in excellent spirits. He said he had no objection to return to 
New York. On reaching the quarters assigned him he looked himself 
over comically, and turning to the Captain, said: "You see I have 
been trying to brush myself up a little out of respect for the people I 
am going to see." He kept up his spirits during the entire voyage, 
never showed any trace of despondency, nor did I ever hear him utter 
a word of regret that he had been overtaken in his flight. 

During the voyage to New York, which was long and 
rough, Tweed became quite a favorite with the officers. 
Said one of them : 

" His behavior was that of a perfect gentleman. He was always 
glad to see any of us when we called upon him. Being, of course, 



A PATHETIC APPEAI, FOR MERCY. TjAS 

thoroughly posted iu New York politics, he used to entertiiin us with 
funuv stories of the way in which ekctions were sometimes carried iu 
that city. His remiuisceuces of the Fourth Ward were particularly 
amu'^iug. In his habils he was very abstemious. Tliough told that 
everything in the ship was at his disposal, he made no extra demands. 
lie did not smoke, nor did he drink either wine or spirits, uidess wlien 
unwell. Most of his time he spent in reading, and when urged by tiie 
Captain, on the Surgeon's recommendation, to take an airing on deck, 
he only availed himself of the privilege once. Perhaps he felt it humili- 
ating to walk the deck in company with an ofBcer on guard." 

On November 19, 1876, the Franklin arrived in New 
York, and on November 23, Tweed was delivered to the 
Sheritt" of the Comity and was consigned to his old quarters 
in Ludlow street jail, a structure \vhich, as a member of 
the Board of Supervisors, he himself had helped to build. 

On December 6, he wrote a most pitiful and pathetic 
letter to Charles O'Conor, offering to give up all his prop- 
erty, and for the first time to open his lips against his 
friends, and testify to all he knew of the Eing frauds, on 
condition of being released. He wrote : 

I regret to say that my means have become utterly inadequate. I 
would not make this offer, if I had not some assurance, through un- 
published statements, that the vindication of principle and the prospect 
of purifying the public service are objects yo\i have in view, as being 
more desirable than the receiving of money. I am an old man, greatly 
broken down in health, cast down in spirit, and can no longer bear my 
burden. To mitigate the prospect of a hopeless imprisonment, which 
must speedily terminate my life, I should, it seems to me, make any 
sacrifice or effort. Viewing the fact of my return to the wards of this 
prison, realizing the events in the City and in the State, which I am 
brought here to confront, it will not, I hope, seem to be an insincerity 
in me to say, I am indeed overwhelmed ; that, all further resistance 
being hopeless, I have none now to make, and only seek the shortest 
and most efficient manner in which I can yield an unqualified surrender. 

The letter was sent by O'Conor to Attorney-General 
Fairchild, but had no effect towards procuring Tweed's re- 
lease. It was the general impression at the time that 
O'Conor was disposed to favor the release, upon the condi- 
tions offered, and it is significant that, finding no action 



5C6 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

taken by the Attorney-General on the letter, he immedi- 
ately after severed liis connection with the Tweed suits 
altogether. Possibly O'Conor suspected that certain per- 
sons in official control and in State and National affairs 
were using Tweed's imprisonment as a pawn in the game 
of politics, wherein his confession inculpating several 
prominent men was supposed to play an effective part. 

In the negotiations which followed, John D. Townsend 
acted as Tweed's counsel. Through him statements were 
prepared and submitted by Tweed to the Attorney-General 
in April, 1877, containing serious charges against certain 
politicians in town and country, and others high in office, 
which he proposed to verify by his own testimony, and by 
other means, on condition that he should be released. 
Though the document was kept a secret by Fairchild, to be 
returned to Tweed in case it was not used, a garbled ab- 
stract of it somehow found its way, as soon as written, into 
a New York paper. On an investigation which followed, 
Tweed was examined, and denied that he authorized any- 
one to publish the so-called " confession " or that he was in 
any way responsible for its appeai'ance. "It contains," 
said he, " some facts, but the larger part of it is fictitious." 
In the confession submitted by Mr. Townsend, in the 
month of April, 1877, to the Attorney-General, on Tweed's 
behalf, the statements were of the most sweeping character. 

After a delay of a month, during which Tweed's hopes 
rose and fell in an agony of suspense, the announcement by 
the Attorney-General that he did not intend to use the 
testimony upon which hung Tweed's last chance of liberty, 
was a crushing blow to him. After a lapse of more than 
four weeks' deliberation, the great legal functionary had 
discovered that the testimony of the prisoner and the prop- 
erty he offered to surrender were not an equivalent for his 
release. There was indignation as well as sorrow in the 
Tweed apartments in Ludlow street, when the news arrived. 



TWEED CHARGES HAD 1 AITFl. 567 

Upon Tweed liinit>elf the blow fell like a stroke of fate, 
ami he received it witli tlie stolid air of a man wlio liad lost 
the power of feelinj^. lie seemed even to lack energy 
enough to feel angry. Not so his friends. They openly 
accused Fairchild of bad faith and foul play. He had re- 
ceived the confession under an agreement to release Tweed, 
in case it was shown to anyone but his professional col- 
leagues, or made use of for any other purpose than the one 
originally intended. Fairchild, they said, had kept his 
promise in neither respect. 

The failure of the negotiations with the Attorney-General 
had a marked effect on the health and spirits of Tweed. 
His hair rapidly became white ; his eye lost the sparkle 
and brilliancy for which it was noted ; he talked but seldom, 
grew listless, and seemed to become indifferent to the 
future. 

Some desultory efforts w'ere still made for his release. A 
petition, with that view, was got up and circulated through- 
out the City by Hugh J. Hastings, a Republican, and editor 
of the Commercial Advertise7\ Then, after the Fall elections 
of 1877, the Tammany Aldermen . took his case in hand, 
and recommended his release to Attorney-General Schoon- 
maker ; but without effect. Albany was silent ; the inter- 
ference of the Aldermen was not even recognized. Mean- 
while, Tweed had testified for the City in various suits, 
perhaps in the faint hope that it might in some way help 
liis case. Finally, on the 26tli of March, 1878, being brought 
into the Supreme Court on the suit of the assignees of the 
estate of one John L. Brown, he declined to give any more 
testimony until what he deemed a pledge had been fulfilled. 
Then he })roduced Comptroller Kelly's letter, saying that 
Attorney-General Fairchild had given his promise to release 
him. This, Mr. Fairchild flatly denied, at the same time 
accusing Kelly of collusion with Tweed and his counsel to 
get Tweed released. A few questions further were put to 



568 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

him ; but, gravely smiling, Tweed refused to answer, and 
left the room. He could boldly disregard contempt pro- 
ceedings, inasmuch as he was already in prison. He got 
into his carriage and went back to jail. He never left it 
again alive. 

A few days after, he was prostrated by a cold supposed 
to have been caught on this occasion, which rapidly devel- 
oped what proved to be fatal symptoms of pneumonia, 
and, on the morning of April 12, 1878, he died. 

Tweed's end was sad enough to have touched the heart 
of even the sternest enemy of corruption. There was no 
relative and very few friends at his bedside, when he 
breathed his last. His daughter, Mrs. Douglas, had left 
him an hour before, in order to get him some delicacies 
for which he had expressed a desire, and had not returned. 
His brother, who had been summoned as the approach of 
death became apparent, had not yet arrived. His son 
William had gone with his mother to Europe some weeks 
previously. His son Richard had been there several 
months, and his youngest and favorite daughter, Mrs. 
Maginnis, was then living in Kew Orleans. At the head 
of his bed stood Luke Grant, a colored servant of the jail, 
specially detailed to wait upon him by Warden A. Watson. 
He had been awake four nights. ISTear him stood Dr. 
Carnochan, the physician in attendance, and in various 
positions around the bed were Mr. Douglas, his son-in-law, 
Mr. Eggleston, who had been one of his counsel, Mr. S. 
Foster Dewey, his private secretary, Mrs. Fitzsimmons, the 
matron of the jail, and her daughter. The dying man, 
though conscious till a few minutes before his death, spoke 
little. Once, just after the matron's daughter had given 
him a drink of flaxseed tea, he said to her : " Mary, I have 
tried to do good to everybody, and if I have not, it was 
not my fault." Some minutes before he lost consciousness, 
Mr. Eggleston went to the head of the bed, when Tweed, 



BURIAL OF THE 1U)SS IN (iltK ENWOOl) CEMETERY. r,.M» 



lien 



ciillini^r him by his tirst name, said faintly : " I hope Til 
and Fairchikl are satisfied now." These were his last 
words. Almost immediately after, he became unconscious, 
and exactly at noon, while the clock of the neighboring 
Essex market was striking the hour, lie died. 

Under the regulation providing for such proceedings, in 
the case of a person dying in jail, Coroner Woltman held 
an inquest in the afternoon of the same day, wlien a ver- 
dict was returned, in accordance with the medical testi- 
mony, that deceased had died of pericarditis, complicated 
with pneumonia and disease of the kidneys. 

On Wednesday morning, April 17, 1878, Tweed was 
buried in Greenwood Cemetery. A i)rocession of eight 
carriages and a hearse started from the house of his son-in- 
law, Mr. Douglas, 65 East Seventy- seventh street. On its 
route through Madison avenue. Forty-seventh street. Fifth 
avenue, Fourteenth street and Broadway to Hamilton 
Ferry, there was no outward sign of mourning or even of 
interest anywhere. The procession barely even attracted 
attention. "If he had died in 1870," remarked Coroner 
Woltman, "Broadway would have been festooned with 
black, and every military and civil organization in the City 
would have followed him to Greenwood." At the entrance 
to the cemetery, the cortege was met by a delegation of 
Free Masons, to which Order Tweed had belonged. After 
the coffin had been lowered into the grave, the funeral 
service was read by the Rev. Dr. Price, the minister who 
had married him. That done. Past Master E. O. Penfield, 
of Palestine Lodge, F. and A. M., stepped to the head of 
the grave, book in hand and in full Masonic regalia. ^ Re- 
questing his brother Masons to form a circle round it, he 
read the Masonic ritual for the burial of the dead, in a 
loud, clear voice, broken only by the sobs of Mrs. Maginnis, 
Tweed's youngest daughter. AVith these simple ceremoni- 
als, in the presence only of his kinsfolk and a few old 



5^0 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

friends, was laid in his last resting-place a man who, a few 
years before, had more than a monarch's power in the 
metropolis of the Western Hemisphere. 




(l<<'diawn from Harper's Weekly. Hy permission. Copyright, 1S1(>, hy Harper i\: Brothers.) 

William M. Evakts, 



LETTPm XLV. 

How William 'M. Evakts Kept His Word— A Reminiscence 
OF THK Civil War— Graphic Description of the Attack 

OF THE KaM MeRRIMAC ON THE UNION ShIP CUMBERLAND — 

Making Good a Promise of Seventeen Years' Standing 
— A Characteristic Letter to Postmaster James — 
Favor Which the Republican Secretary of State Ex- 
tended TO an Humble Democrat. 

My dear Dean : 

The mention of William M. Evarts' name in my last let- 
ter recalls an incident which deserves recording. You in 
England know Mr. Evarts as our representative in the Ala- 
bama Claims arbitration, and afterwards as Secretary of State 
in the Cabinet of President Hayes. Mr. Evarts is a scholar, a 
wit, a great lawyer — the lawyer, in fact, who succeeded 
Charles O'Conor as leader of the 'New York Bar. Like 
Horace Greeley, he finds relaxation on his farm among 
the Vermont hills, and is an enthusiastic fancier of Jersey 
cattle. 

As a practical farmer and grazier, however, Mr. Evarts is 
not much more of a success than was Horace Greeley in the 
same line. Some years ago Mr. Evarts had a party of friends 
from AYashington and Xew York dining at his farm. To 
these guests he said, with a twinkle in his eye : " Gentle- 
men, will you try milk or champagne ? On grounds of 
economy, I recommend champagne. Quart for quart, the 
milk costs considerably more ! " 

While having an exterior of apparent austerity, Mr. 
Evarts is really at heart a man of the most tender sensi- 
bilities. While I was chairman of the Board of School 
Trustees of the Seventh Ward of this City, in 1878, a man 

571 



573 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

named James Marlow came to me and requested my assist- 
ance to have liim employed as a painter by the contractor 
who was then engaged by the Trustees to paint Grammar 
School No. 2, in Henry street. 

Marlow had a wife and seven children to support. I told 
him to call at my house the following evening, and during 
my conversation with him there, he disclosed the fact that 
he was one of the survivors of the " Cumberland Crew," 
whose warsliip went down before the assault of the Con- 
federate ram Merrimac, and in that connection he handed 
me a little printed book, bound handsomely in calf, wherein 
was given an account of the great demonstration or recej:)- 
tion tendered to the survivors of the " Cumberland Crew, " 
at the Academy of Music, in 1861. 

The presiding officer of that patriot demonstration was 
William E. Dodge, and many of the most prominent men 
of the city participated in the ceremonies, or occupied seats 
on the platform. Amongst them was William M. Evarts 
who made the principal speech of the occasion. Some of 
the surviving officers of the ill-fated warship were intro- 
duced and made short addresses. Toward the end Mr. 
Dodge stepped to the front of the platform and said . 
"Ladies and Gentlemen, I will now introduce one of the* 
sailors of the gallant crew." This sailor, in the few short 
sentences which comprised his speech, took the audience 
by storm. His language was largely interspersed with 
nautical phrases and pungent remarks. As he finished, 
somebody in the audience asked : " What is that sailor's 
name?" The chairman answered :" James Marlow." The 
part of Marlow's speech that most pleased the audience 
was his brief description of the naval engagement, as fol- 
lows : 

The Captain of the Merrimac called out to the gallant Captain of our 
ship, when he was closing up to us: " Will you surrender? " Says our 
Captain : " Never will I surrender," at the same time firing a broadside 
at the Merrimac. But the ba'ls were no more than if hailstones 



HOW W.M. M. EVAirrS KHl'T JUS WOIU). r,7."3 

fell on her. With that the Captain of the Menimac run his iniVrnul 
raachiue into the side of the Cumberland, diggiui; a bij? hole in her. 
Then the Mcrriniac drew back a short distance, and says her Captain 
to our Captain: " Now, will you surrender?" Says our Captain: 
" Never will 1 .surrender," and with that he again run his infernal 
machine into our side; and then I took a dead bead on him, and I don't 
think he is alive now. 

Bearing in mind that William M. Evarts was, at the time 
of my interview with Marlow, U. S. Secretary of State, I 
took the book, saying to Marlow that I would return it 
later. I asked him if he thought Mr. Evarts woidd remem- 
ber him, after the seventeen years which had elapsed since 
that demonstration. He shook his head and said he did 
not think so ; '' but," he added, " I remember, when I got 
through with my say, Mr. Evarts, who was the great orator 
of the evening, shook my hand warmly, and said that if he 
ever could do anything for me he would." 

Next day, I went to the office of Mr. Evarts. in Wall 
street, to inquire when he would be in the City from Wash- 
ington, and was informed that he was expected here in a 
few days, to argue an important motion in Court. My 
office was then in the Yanderbilt building, 132 Nassau 
street, and a few days thereafter, in looking out the window, 
I saw Mr. Evarts walking down towards Wall street, with 
his dilapidated hat tipped back on his head, and carrying a 
bundle of law papers in his hand. I gave him time to 
reach his office, and then went to see him, with Marlow's 
book in my possession. I sent in my card and was j^romptly 
admitted. After shaking hands, I said to him: ''Mr. 
Evarts, I have come to draw your attention to a speech 
which you made in 1S61." "Oh, indeed!" said he, " I 
hope it was a good one." " Yes," I replied, " a great one." 
Then I produced the little book and pointed to his speech. 
He glanced over it with deep interest, and after a time, 
said : " I remember that incident well, but what of it now ? " 
I then turned over the pages and pointed to the sailor 



574 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Marlow's speech, requesting liim to read it. When he had 
done so, he said, looking inquiringly at me, " I remember 
that incident also." I then explained Marlow's unfortunate 
position, and said that the old sailor asserts that jou shook 
his hand upon that occasion, and promised that if he ever 
needed assistance, you would help him ; and he and I now 
think that you are in a position, as Secretary of State, to 
put him and his helpless family beyond want by a few lines 
from your pen. He asked how? I suggested the Custom 
House or the Post-Office. Without another word, he took 
from his desk writing paper and addressed a letter to Gen- 
eral Thomas L. James, then Postmaster of this City. 

This letter was three pages in length, and while writing 
it, he I'eferred occasionally to the little book. It was an 
admirable letter, and I deeply regret that I did not retain 
a copy of it, but I recollect that it contained the most patri- 
otic sentiments. It recalled that period of the Civil War, 
and briefly described how the gallant conduct of the Cum- 
berland Crew had evoked patriotic ardor for the Union 
cause, throughout the country, perhaps more than any 
other incident of that time, and how much the people were 
indebted to those who served them so nobly in that terrific 
encounter. He concluded his letter in a vein of dry humor, 
as follows : 

Mr. Marlow's claim now upon me specially is, that both he and I 
then made speeches on the same platform, and that I then promised 
him that if I could ever aid him I would. Will you now aid me to 
redeem that promise, by appointing him to some position in your De- 
partment, which he may be competent to fill? 

Inside of ten days, Marlow was appointed to a position 
by General James, in one of the bureaux of the Post Office, 
and has froin time to time been promoted for faithful 
and efficient services. It is significant to note the fact that 
Marlow was then a pronounced Democrat, but his politics 
were not inquired into. 



LETTER XLVT. 

Bitter Contest Between Boss Kelly and Boss Tilden 
—Marvellous Success of the Latter as a Political 
Manipulator— How He Paved His Way to a Presiden- 
tial Nomination— Attaining the Pinnacle of a Life's 
Ambition Only to Be Cheated at Last— A Vengeful 
"War to THE Knife" ON Governor Lucius Robinson— 
The Tammany Bolt and Its Disastrous Results— Amus- 
ing Incident at a State Convention— How a Guberna- 
torial Boom Was Burst. 

My dear Dean : 

Going to out-of-town Conventions was always a source 
of gladness to New York politicians. Especially interest- 
ing and jovial was the attendance at the quadrennial 
National (or Presidential) Conventions ; and notably so was 
the visit of the delegates to the Convention held at St. 
Louis in 1876. Samuel J. Tilden, having worked heart and 
soul, hut without success, to again get tlie nomination for 
the Presidency for his friend Seymour, in 1872, thought it 
was time to " set up business for himself ;" so he managed 
to influence the nu-al districts of this State to favor his 
nomination for Governor in 1871, when, enjoying the 
prestige of a champion reformer who had helped to "down" 
the Tammany Ring and impeach the corrupt Judiciary, he 
was triumphantly elected. Then his efforts were concen- 
trated on securing for himself the nomination for the 
Presidency in 1876. This was no easy iob ; for the State of 
New York had had the Democratic nomination (Horatio 
Seymour I in 1808; and, in 1872, the nominee of the 
Liberal-Republicans, (who had been endorsed by the Dem- 
ocracy) was Horace Greeley, also of New York ; and now 

575 



576 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

for Tilden, Governor of New York State, to start out on a 
still hunt for the Presidency was generally regarded as 
a little bit too much New York, and provoked some hostil- 
ity. Especially was Tilden's ambition distasteful to John 
Kelly, who, as leader of Tammany Hall, began to "reach 
out," and whose desire to be consulted on political matters 
extended over " the whole boundless continent." Tilden, 
who maintained a private political bureau, and kept in 
correspondence with two or three chosen friends in every 
election district of the State, to whom he sent lithographic 
letters over his autograph, had, through his manipulation 
of the several districts, created " a demand " for his nomi- 
nation for Governor, which Kelly did not like, but could 
not help; and Tilden also had ''a barrel of money" to aid 
his indomitable energy and advance his efforts to carry 
off the Presidential prize. 

When the New York State Convention was held to 
choose delegates to the Presidential Convention, Kelly again 
iound himself euchred ; for Tilden had, as stated, been 
quietly at work " creating sentiment " in the interior, and, 
when the delegates got together, Tilden was their choice 
for President, although the Tammany delegation said " nay " 
and made a determined opposition to the adoption of a 
resolution, offered in the Convention, that " the delegates 
from the State of New York to the St. Louis (Missouri) 
Convention be instructed to cast their votes as a unit for 
Samuel J. Tilden as the Democratic nominee for the 
Presidency." 

Appreciating the opposition of Kelly, and doubtless 
feeling assured that that gentleman would use every effort 
to manifest his antagonism in and around the National 
Convention, Tilden at once proceeded to organize a 
delegation, to go to St. Louis, outside of Tammany Hall, 
which organization he was advised intended to make a big 
demonstration against him. And when the time for the 



DEl'AUTUUE FOR A PRESIDENTIAL COxNVENTION. .'..": 

rresidentiul Convention approaeliecl, all tlic available re- 
sources of the Pennsylvania Railroad, as well as sncli ac- 
commodation on the New York Central llailroad as was 
not reciuired for the Tammany delegation and their follow- 
ers (nearly one thousand strong,) were secured to accommo- 
date " the Friends of Tilden." 

There was, of course, quite a time when tlicse trains 
left New York and Jersey City en route to St. Louis. 
Tammany had its trains handsomely festooned, every As- 
sembly district having its own sleeping car, on the outside 
of which was a muslin strip designating the number of the 
district; every car had its own caterer and an ample supply 
of ju-ovisions, etcetera (there was plenty of " et cetera" 
of all kinds) ; and as Tammany had determhied to make a 
sensation en route, it took with its two passenger trains a 
band of music; while, with other accoutrements, every 
loyal Tammanyite also had "a knife up his sleeve;" for, 
while their delegates were compelled to acquiesce in the 
vote for Tilden in the Convention, the end and aim of this 
grand demonstration was to " damn him with faint praise," 
and in every way try to prevent his nomination. 

The outside "delegation, or "Friends of Tilden," was 
made up of independent clubs and representatives of anti- 
Tammany organizations. All wpre Samuel J. Tilden 
badges on the lapels of their coats, and, being well pro- 
vided with "creature comforts," departed from Jersey 
City, full of enthusiasm (not unmixed with whiskey,) de- 
termined to do their best to convince the delegates from 
other States at St. Louis that New York was earnest and 
sincere in her advocacy of Mr. Tilden and would give him, 
if nominated, her electoral vote. 

AVhen these four or five train-loads of New Yorkers 
reached their destination, the disembarking of the delega- 
tions created much stir in St. Louis, which was already well 
lilled with representatives from the South and AVest ; and 



5T8 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Kelly was not a little surprised, upon liis arrival, to find that 
Tilden had extended his " influence ' ' as far West as St. Louis. 
Banners with the inscription " New York's Choice for Presi- 
dent, Sani'l J. Tilden," stared him in the face in all public 
places. A band of music was in waitinc^ to meet the " Friends 
of Tilden " as soon as they left the Pennsylvania Railroad 
trains ; and before the Tammany Hall representatives really 
knew " where they were at," a New York Tilden proces- 
sion was eliciting cheers from the crowds of visitors from 
other States who thronged the sidewalks. A picked num- 
ber of orators from New York State were among these 
" Friends of Tilden," and arrangements were soon made 
for meetings in various parts of the city, at which good 
speakers extolled the virtues and capabilities of " the Great 
Reformer." They were instructed not to indulge in an- 
tagonisms toward Tammany ; their sole object, on the con- 
trary, was to convince everybody that the Empire State was 
virtually solid for Tilden. 

John Kelly was amazed to find how skilfully everything 
had been arranged to check his plans ; and it was decided 
that Tammany Hall's delegation should make a parade the 
next day, but there was to be '' no show of hands " until 
after scouting parties, selected to visit the headquarters of 
delegations from other States,' should have reported the 
situation at Tammany's headquarters. And when these 
scouts did report that they had found "fireworks meet- 
ings " and considerable enthusiasm in almost every part of 
the City, with orators advocating Tilden' s nomination, 
Kelly at once realized that " discretion was the better part 
of valor." The great political organizer had checkmated 
him again, and any open fight against a candidate backed 
u^ by an " instructed " vote from his own State, and so 
well liked in almost every State from which reports had 
been received, would only endanger the " regularity " of 
Tammany Hall in the City and County of New York. An 



EXCITED STATE OF ^ UBLIC FEELING. 57» 

onk'f was therefore given to "■ slieathe knives," and exhibit, 
not an enthusiastic, hut u passive adherence to the prevail- 
ing sentiment. 

The '' Friends of Tilden " were, of course, rejoiced at 
the success which had crowned the efforts of their great 
leader to turn the tables on Tannnany, but were politic 
enough to refrain from irritating exultations. Nevertheless 
they kept the Tilden ball rolling, on the ground that " eter- 
nal vigilance was the price of " — Tilden. And the out- 
come of the Convencion, held in the hottest city of the 
United States, during a heated term of the hottest month 
of the year (June), was the triumphant nomination of 
Samuel J. Tilden, of New York, for President, and Thomas 
A. Hendricks, of Indiana, for Yice-President. 

The result of the Presidential election in 1876 was an 
acrimonious dispute. Both parties claimed to have carried 
the States of Louisiana and Florida, and each charged 
fraud. But the Canvassing 'Boards of those States were in 
the hands of the Radicals, under " carpet-bag government," 
and of course declared the Republican Electors chosen, 
which gave Rutherford B. Hayes a majority of one vote 
(^ Hayes having 185 Electoral votes and Tilden 184), 
and the certificates of these results, signed by the Governors 
of Louisiana and Florida, were forwarded to Washington. 
It was inevitable that this condition of affairs should pro- 
duce a very excited state of public feeling— a feeling actu' 
aliy bordering on revolution ; for the Democrats, through 
agents sent to investigate the action of the Boards of Can- 
vassers in those States, had ample proof of the fraud sought 
to be perpetrated ; and it required a constant application of 
'• soothing syrup" on the part of the Deniocraiic leaders to 
prevent a serious resistance to what they denounced as " a 
plot of the Radicals to steal the Presidency, for the purpose 
of covering up the rascalities of a rotten Administration." 
Finally, to avoid a further disturbance of business, already 



580 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

much demoralized on account of the depression resulting 
from tlie panic of 1 873, an Act was passed to refer all contested 
elections in any of tlie States to a Commission, composed of 
five Senators, five Representatives, and five Judges of the 
United States Supreme Court, the decision of this Commis- 
sion to be final unless set aside by a concurrent vote of the 
two Houses of Congress. This Commission, refusing to go 
behind the returns, as certified to by the Governors of the 
States referred to, decided in each contested case, by a vote 
of eight to seven, in favor of the Republican Electors ; and 
on the second day of March, 1877, Rutherford B. Hayes 
was declared duly elected President of the United States, 
having received a majority of one Electoral vote, as 1 have 
already shown. On March 5, 1877, Hayes was inaugu- 
rated, the country, for the sake of peace and business 
quietude, acquiescing in the decision of the Electoral Com- 
mission. But the mass of Republicans exhibited no en- 
thusiasm over the outcome ; on the contrary, the rank and 
file of the party were not backward in openly expressing 
their belief that Samuel J. Tilden was really entitled to the 
seat occupied by Hayes. 

Although he had been thrice outgeneralled by Tilden 
— first when Tilden had secured the nomination for Gov- 
ernor, then the delegates to the St. Louis Convention, and 
finally the nomination for President — Tammany's chief 
was not subdued. One of the salient traits of his character 
was dogged perseverance and " never say die " ; and, while 
he was in duty bound to yield an honest support to 
Tilden's candidacy, as the nominee of the great Democratic 
party, and did make every Tammany Hall man do his duty 
in that respect, it was reported, in confidential circles, 
that he did not wear crape on his left arm when the eight- 
to-seven Electoral Commission counted Tilden out, and 
Rutherford B. Hayes in, as President of the United 
States. 



KELLY'S WAU ON COVERNdll ROBIN.SON. nSl 

•lohn Kelly still had "a Itonc to pick " with Tihlcii, 
and all the known friends of the latter had to suffer a ]»n)- 
j)ortionate share of his animosity. Among the most con- 
siticuous of these friends was Governor Lucius Robinson, 
who had been recommended by Tilden as a pro]>er candi- 
date for Governor, and had been elected to that office in 
1S7G. 

Governor Robinson was not ignorant of Kelly's hos- 
tility to his friend Tilden. yet, as Kelly had through 
Tammany Hall extended to him an honest support, he had 
no personal grievance with the Tammany leader. But, 
from time to time, Kelly made exactions to which 
Robinson consented with reluctance, until he was at 
length crowded into a position where he had to take sides 
with Tilden in protecting certain friends whose decap- 
itation was demanded by Kelly. From that period a 
coldness grew up between them, wliich increased with the 
lapse of time until, in 1S79, Governor Robinson, upon 
charges which had been presented to him, removed Henry 
A. Gumbleton (a special pet of Mr. Kelly) from the office 
of County Clerk of New York County,and appointed Hubert 
O. Thompson to fill the vacancy. Then there was a terri- 
ble rumpus. Thompson had resigned from Tammany 
Hall, with Edward Cooper and others, in 1877, because, as 
was alleged, of too much arrogance on the part of Kelly, 
and was holding the position of Deputy Commissioner of 
Public AVorks under Commissioner Allan Campbell, who, 
while not in open revolt, was not warm in his feelings 
toward the Tammany Boss, being a strong personal friend 
of Governor Robinson. The Governor's removal of 
Kelly's protege from office and the appointment in his 
j^lace of a man who had resigned from Tammany Hall, was 
regarded by Tammany's chief as an open declaration of 
war. He determined that it should be '' war to the knife 
and from the knife to the hilt,"' and everything was there- 



582 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

aftev shaped accordingly.- Kelly now liad two antagonists 
to figlit, Tilden and Robinson, and no one who was known 
to be on speaking terms with either of those gentlemen 
could expect any favor at his hands. 

The time came for a State Convention, in 1879, to nom- 
inate a candidate for the office of Governor, as Mr. Robin- 
son's term would expire on the last day of that year. The 
Convention was again to be held at Syracuse, a city fre- 
quently selected for State Conventions, because located so 
near the geographical centre of the State. The delegates 
to that Convention from Tammany Hall, I need scarcely 
add, were not in favor of the renomination of Governor 
Robinson, but, on the contrary, were most bitterly opposed 
to him. " Any one to beat Robinson " was the burden of 
their song. For, at a meeting of the Tammany Committee 
on Organization, held on September 6, 1879, John Kelly 
offered the following resolution : 

Resolved, That in case the Democratic State Convention insists upon 
the renomination of Lucius Robinson as the candidate for Governor, 
the Tammany delegation will leave in a body. 

This resolution was unanimously adopted, and Messrs. 
John Kelly, Augustus Schell and Frederick Smyth were 
appointed a Committee to acquaint delegates from other 
parts of the State with the action had by Tammany. 

The delegates sent to the Syracuse Convention by the Irv- 
ing Hall (or Anti-Tammany) organization were strongly in 
favor of the renomination of Governor Robinson, and 
when the roll of counties was called, their credentials, as 
well as those of the Tammany Hall delegation, were pre- 
sented and referred to the Committee on Credentials. Be- 
fore that Committee had time to make a report, however, 
at a caucus of the Irving Hall delegation the following 
resolution was adopted : 

Resolved, That, in order to avoid any pretext on the part of the 
Tammany delegation to carry into effect their threatened opposition to 



^f.\^•(EUVRIN(; for a Tammany rolt. &S3 

the oU'ctu'ii of Governor Ivobinsoii, if lio slioiilii he the noiiiiiiec of this 
Couveution for riovornor. we, the Irviiiu; IIa1l delei^ation from New 
York City, thougli chxiiniiig to be rightfully entitled to seats in the 
Convention, beg leave respectfully to withdraw from the consideration 
of the Committee to whom they were referred, the credentials we this 
d:iy presented to the Convention. 

This )-esolution, signed bj John R. Fellows, Joliii Fox, 
lf;i Sliafor, Jiinics Daly .and Nelson J. AVaterbury, on be- 
lialf of the delegation, was received and approved with an 
iiitlinsiastic bur^t of applause from the Convention, being 
regarded as an apparently manly concession for the sake of 
unity in the party. There had been bolts before in Dem- 
ocratic State Conventions, notably the " Did Hunker " and 
" Barnburner" contests of forty years previously, but these 
were both bolts on principle. It remained for Tammany 
Hall, the great stickler for " regularity," to enter a Con- 
vention, accept its platform, and bolt the nomination ! The 
reports of Committees on Contested Seats, on Permanent 
Organization, and on Platform had been presented and 
unanimously approved. The Tammany delegates had even 
participated in nominating representatives for the State 
Committee ; and up to this time all had remained in their 
uncontested seats. But now the Convention had reached 
the order of " nominatitms," and several gentlemen had 
spoken in advocacy of Governor Robinson, General Slo- 
cum, and others whose names had been presented, when 
Patrick H. Cowen, of Sartitoga, who was sitting in close 
})roximity to John Kelly, of New York, arose — doubtless 
in accordance with a prearranged plan — and nominated 
John C. Jacobs, of Brooklyn, Chairman of the Convention, 
for Governor, in imitation of the tactics which had won 
at the Democratic National Convention of 1868, M-hen 
Horatio Seymour, its presiding officer, w^as nominated for 
President. 

Upon the announcement of ]\[r. Jacobs' name, the entire 



&S4 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Tammany delegation jumped to tlieir feet, stood iipon 
chairs, hiirralied to the top of their voices, while their 
" claqueurs " in the gallery shouted and screamed and flung 
their hats, creating a terrific uproar in the hall. Major 
Quincy, one of the Tammany delegates, who was acting as 
Heading Secretary and sitting beside the Chairman, at a 
request from one of his associates, who was vainly demand- 
ing '' Question ! question ! " rose, stepped forward, and had 
got out the words " All in favor of the nomination—" when 
Chairman Jacobs demanded that he take his seat. " Let's 
have no nonsense here," said Jacobs. In the mean- 
time, the uproar continued, and finding that pounding 
with his gavel did no good, and that all his efforts to obtain 
quiet in the Convention were for the time useless, the pre- 
siding oflicer sat down to let those engaged in the noisy 
demonstration howl themselves out. No sooner had he 
done this, however, than Major Quincy again jumped to 
his feet, and went through the form of putting the motion 
to nominate Jacobs for Governor "by acclamation." 
The Tammany delegates again gave vent to a vociferous 
" aye " assisted by their friends in the gallery, when Major 
Quincy coolly declared the motion carried, and that " Hon. 
John C. Jacobs was the unanimous nominee of the Con- 
vention for Governor." This was a proceeding not un- 
familiar to the adherents of Tammany Hall at Ward 
meetings, but the gentlemen from other parts of the State 
were not accustomed to it ; and, the rules of the Assembly 
having been adopted for the governance of the Convention, 
Jacobs was too able a parliamentarian, and too honest 
a man, to permit that body to be captured by a trick, even 
though the condition of affairs was seemingly designed for 
his personal advancement. Waiting until order was a little 
restored he, in a dignified manner, reproved the Reading 
Secretary for presuming to assume the role of presiding 
officer, and then promptly declined the nomination, addino; 



ADOPTING TlIK KULE-OIMIUIN I'OIJCY. 5a-> 

that '' a motion which rcMpiired uiiaiiiinous (.-onseiit (Muild 
not bo put iu sucli scliool-boy fashion." 

Foiled in this manoeuvre, the Tannnaiiy delegates then 
chimored for a recess. On this motion the " ayes " and 
«' nays " were demanded, and the "' nays " preponderated at 
U'ust four to one. Then, realizini,^ that all their efforts to 
prevent the renomination of Governor Ivobinson were futile, 
Aui^ustus Schell arose and stated that, it being quite 
a[)parent to the delegates from ISTew York that their voice 
in the Convention was unheeded, " tlie delegates from 
Tammany Hall would withdraw," which they did, receiv- 
ing a round of hisses and groans from the remaining dele- 
gates, as John Kelly and his cohorts made their exit from 
the hall. Boss McLaughlin, of Brooklyn — who, with the 
entire delegation from that city, was seated almost imme- 
diately iu front of the presiding officer, and who, being a 
-warm friend of Governor Robinson, looked with contempt 
upon the endeavor of the Tannminy Spider to induce his 
Brooklyn Fly to " walk into its parlor," — made a motion 
that, inasmuch as the delegation from Tammany Hall had 
voluntarily vacated their seats in the Convention, the l^ew 
York delegation from Irving Hall, which, for the sake of 
harmony, had refrained from insisting upon their claims, be 
invited to fill the vacancies as the regularly constituted del- 
egates to the Convention. This motion eliciting much 
applause and being carried, the business in hand was pro- 
ceeded with in regular order, resulting in the nomination of 
Lucius Robinson for Governor, and Clarkson N. Potter 
for Lieutenant-Governor, as well as other State officers ; and 
the Convention adjourned as if nothing unusual had 
happened. 

The disgruntled Tammany delegates then held a caucus 
at their hotel headquarters, at which it was determined to 
hire another hall (the Shakespeare), hold another Con- 
vention, and nominate Boss John Kellv for Governor, 



586 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

This decision was fully carried out. The liall was secured ; 
a Rump Convention was organized ; a list of delegates was 
made out to represent all the counties of the State (but 
three-quarters of these delegates resided in New York City) ; 
and an appeal to the Democracy of the State having been 
hastily prepared, John Kelly, of New York City, was 
nominated for Governor, and Clarkson N. Potter, the 
nominee of the Regular Convention, was nominated for 
Lieutenant Governor, and all the other State nominees of 
the Regular Convention were also endorsed. Then the 
Rump assemblage adjourned sine die. 

Thus Boss Kelly had adopted a desperate method to 
revenge himself on one of his antagonists ; for, as he stated 
in accepting the nomination, he had no hope of an election, 
but he would make certain the defeat of Lucius Rob- 
inson. He polled over 70,000 votes — enough to enable 
Alonzo B. Cornell, the Republican nominee for Governor, 
to secure nearly 40,000 majority over Mr. Robinson ; and 
the demoralization this performance created in the party 
lost to the Democracy the Lieutenant-Governor, as well as 
the Legislature, and lost consequently a Democratic United 
States Senator to be elected by the Legislature of 1880 in 
place of Senator Francis Kernan. The other results, of this 
action on the part of Mr. Kelly I shall have to speak of in 
another letter, and will close this epistle by relating a some- 
what amusing episode which occurred during the holding 
of the Syracuse Convention. 

Tammany's avowal of its willingness to accept "anybody 
to beat Robinson " had had the effect of unearthing candi- 
dates from every section of the State. The hotels were 
full of caucuses, and "booms" in plenty were started. 
Among those whose names came to the front was General 
Nixon, of Erie county. Some of his enthusiastic friends 
— no doubt, without his knowledge or consent— were seized 
with the idea that if they made a stir in his behalf , they 



AMUSING INCIDENT OF THE CONVENTION. 587 

might get Tainniaiiy's su|)[)oi-t (this was on the evening 
]n-evious to Kelly's secession), and perliai)s the Governorship 
lightning might strike their favorite. So, after discussing 
the possibilities during the course of a few rounds at the 
bar of their liotel — and with each round the number of Gen. 
Nixon's enthusiasts rapidly increased — a gentleman who 
liad been a silent listener to the boomers, but an always 
ready participant in the '* inspiration " of the occasion, ven- 
tured the suggestion that a huudred-and-fifty dollars would 
secure a good band for an liour or two, and if they would 
raise the money and send somebody with him, he would 
guarantee to have the band and one of the best local orators, 
all cocked and primed to start a boom for Nixon, within an 
hour. Three of the original Nixon boomers volunteered to 
put up fifty dollars each, and after another " round," with 
cheers for their proposed nominee, one of the three started 
off with the proposer of the band idea, in order to carry out 
his suggestion. 

It so happened that the band they started to secure was 
that night having a rehearsal at its headrpiarters near the 
birthplace of the "boom"; a bargain was quickly struck, 
and in less than half an hour the band was at the door, and 
the Syracuse Demosthenes, having joined in a "hurrah" 
for General Nixon and " taken something," was ready for 
business. So the band struck up a tune, a crowd gathered 
around the hotel, and the soberest of the three friends 
of General Nixon, taking a chair on which to stand, stated 
to those assembled that this was the inauguration of a move- 
ment in favor of General Nixon, of Erie, for Governor, 
and he would have the pleasure of introducing an eloquent 
gentleman who would state to them how capable a man the 
General was, etc., etc. And so the wind-mill began to 
move. 

Just about this time, along came Colonel James J. Mooney, 
Ambrose II. Purdy, and two or three other well- 



588 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

known Westchester County gentlemen, wlio Lad returned 
from a fruitless pacificatory mission to Tammany head- 
quarters. Hearing the boom in operation, Mr. Purdy in- 
quired as to particulars ; and upon ascertaining that scarcely 
any one seemed to know who Gen. Nixon was, Col. Mooney, 
calling his friends aside, said : 

" Let's have some fun ! You, Purdy, must personate 
Gen. Nixon. Go with our friends to the Eagle Hotel, and 
leave the rest to me. Only when I get there with the 
baud, I want you,. Purdy, to be ready to make a speech as 
Gen. Nixon, of Erie." 

Purdy, who was full of fun himself, and who at a 
moment's notice could talk for an hour on any subject, 
jumped at the proposition, and witli his Westchester friends 
started for the Eagle Hotel, only an eighth of a mile dis 
tant. Then Col. Mooney, wlio had a voice strong enough 
to be heard several blocks, exclaimed : " I am sorry to in- 
terrupt your speech, sir; but I have just been advised that 
Gen. Nixon is at the Eagle Hotel, and, having been in- 
formed of this demonstration in his behalf, he would be much 
pleased to have the opportunity of greeting liis friends. I 
therefore move that this meeting adjourn, and that we pro- 
ceed in procession to the Eagle Hotel, there to give General 
Nixon a serenade." The Colonel's motion, being put by 
him, was of course declared carried, and, taking the leader 
of the band by the arm he headed the procession for the 
Eagle Hotel, the band playing " See the Conquering Hero 
Comes." 

When the band reached the hotel, the Colonel told the 
leader to play a nice serenade while he would go inside and 
get the General prepared to say a few words to his friends. 
Finding Pui'dyin tlie cafe, Justin the midst of story-telling 
— in which he was an adept — Mooney hustled him to tlie 
balcony of the hotel, and, motioning to the leader of the 
band " to cease his dulcet strains " for a few moments, 



BURSTING A nUBERNATORIAL BOOM. MO 

piloted Mr. Fuvdy to tlic front, saying: "General, I .shall 
now have the pleasure of introducing you to the gentlemen, 
who, before to-juorrow'.s sun goes down, will have secured 
for you the high honor of a nomination for Governor of 
the Empire State. Gentlemen, I propose three cheers for 
Gen. Nixon, our next Governor ! " The ehoer.s were given, 
of course, followed by a bar or two of music by the band ; 
then Mr. Purdy scpiared himself for a good talk, and had 
just about got through with his " regrets at the short notice 
ho had of their coming, the unexpected honor, his high ap- 
preciation,'' and all that sort of thing, when a half dozen of 
Tammany men (whom Mooney and Purdy had left only a 
half hour jireviously) hove in sight, being attracted to the 
gathering by the sound of Mooney's familiar stentorian 
voice. Listening for a moment or two to Purdy's harangue, 
to catch the drift of his remarks, one of the Tammany men 
exclaimed : '' IIullo, Ollagawalla, what deviltry are you and 
Purdy up to now ? Come off your perch, and bring Nixon- 
Purdy down to have a drink ! " 

The other Tammany men joined in a " Ha! Ha ! " which 
upset Purdy, for he could hardly restrain a laugh himself; 
and the leader of the band, now realizing that the whole' 
thing was a .sell, gave a toot on his cornet, the band moved 
away, the crowd scattered in good humor— and that was 
the end of the boom for Gen. Nixon, of Erie. 

It is needless for me to say that the story of the joke 
soon spread through the little City of Syracuse, and seemed 
to have a very wholesome effect npon ^* booms" generally; 
for, the next day, all such nonsense was dropped, and tlie 
delegates got down to serious business, with the conse- 
•piences which I liave already endeavored to explain. 

One of the results of tliis Syracuse revolt was the resig- 
nation of ex-Governor Hoffman and other prominent gen- 
tlemen from Tammany Hall. Dut, notwithstanding the 
defeat of his friend Pobinson, Tiklen's heart was saved 



590 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLtTlCg. 

from too much depression at tins particular time by the fact 
that a pig-iron speculation into which he and Senator Bar- 
num, of Connecticut, had entered, and into which they had 
bought at $14 a ton, and sold out at $24, brought him 
a consoling profit. 



LETTER XL VII. 

Sequel TO THE Tammany Bolt— Kelly Runs a State Conven- 
tion All His Own — New York Gladiatorial Fight 
Transferred to a Cincinnati Arena — Tilden's Victory 
over Kelly and Kelly's Triumph over Tilden — Both 
Disturbers Hors de Combat and Everybody Happy — 
Republican National Convention and Boss Conkling — 
Solidity of the Stalwart Forces — Turning Defeat into 
General A'ictory — A "Knock Out" which Brings the 
Winner (Garfield) to the Feet of Grant's Champion, 

My dear Dean ; 

!No organization, save one that conld boast of such ancient 
prestige and formidable strength as Tammany, wonld 
liave survived the consequences of the disaster which Kelly, 
in his fight against Tilden and Tilden's friend, Gov. Robin- 
son, had entailed upon the Democratic party of this City 
and State, in the campaign of the year 1879. The 
Democracy was routed, '' horse, foot and dragoons," at the 
election which followed the '"bolt;" but Kelly had 
received, as I have stated, over 70,000 votes in the State, 
including about 40,000 of the supporters of Tammany Ilall, 
who had proved loyal to him ; and, being backed by so large 
a })roportion of the organization, Kelly determined, like 
Grant after the first day's disastrous results in the '" Battle 
of the AVilderness," to " fight it out on that line if it took 
all Summer." In this determination he was sustained by 
all who had aided him in his contest against Tilden and 
Tilden's supporters throughout the State. 

When the call was issued by the Democratic National 
Committee for the assembling of a National Convention at 
Cincinnati, in the month of June, 1880, ?, Democratic State 

m 



r,92 THIRTV YEARS OF NEW foRK POLITICS. 

Convention was called at Riifilie^ter, to select delegates to 
represent tlie State of New York in that Convention. 
Having voluntarily put themselves outside of the "regular" 
organization of the State, by the course pursued after the 
State Convention of the preceding year, it was determined 
by Kell}^ and his friends to hold a State Convention of 
their own ; and they selected for this purpose the same City 
and the same day specified in the call of the Regular Demo- 
cratic State Committee — although, of course, they did not 
meet in the same hall ; so the occasion was not character- 
ized by a reminder of the " Kilkenny cats." 

There was throughout the State a growing anti-Tilden 
sentiment, and the feeling would have assumed vastly 
greater proportions, had it not been for the fact that open 
anti-Tildenism would have been construed as pro -Kelly ism ; 
and the shape which Kelly's aggressiveness had assumed 
was one which the mass of Democrats, loyal to party 
usages, felt that they must condemn. Tilden was in some 
respects a good pcjlitical manager, but his methods had 
been peculiarly selfish, and while he was a good money- 
maker, a shrewd and sharp manipulator of railroad stocks, 
the interests of the Democratic party did not seem to have 
been benefited through his management. When elected 
Governor of this State in 1874, a Democratic majority of 
50,397 votes was recorded in his favor; in 1875, the Demo- 
cratic majority in the State fell to 11,810 ; in 1876, the 
year of his candidacy for President, with a candidate 
against him comparatively unknown in this State, (Ruther- 
ford B. Hayes) his majority was only 26,668 ; the next 
year, 1877, the Democratic majority was only 11,264; in 
1878, the Republicans swamped the Democrats, getting a 
majority of 34,661 ; and in 1879, through Tilden's deter- 
mination to renominate Governor Robinson, (which deter- 
mination was made more intense through his conflict w^ith 
Kelly) the Republican nominee for Governor, Mr. Cornell, 




(Ki'iirawu from llari)fi'.s Weekly. Uy |Hiiiii.s»lnn. CnpyMKlit, 1.s;g, by llai'|nr & UiotliiMB.; 
ISAMUKr, J. Tll-DKN. 



TllK BOSS PLAYINi; A I.ONK HANI). tm 

was electetl hy 12,777 votes. So it w:is [)!;iiiil;,- evidi'iit that 
Tildeii (whom many oUl-timc Democrats eoiidemued for 
what they called *' his craven sid)missiou to the Kepidtlican 
steal,"' in 1870) was not a man to excite enthusiasm and liad 
none of the maii^netismre(|uircd torally around his standard 
the constantly increasing army of young voters in the State 
— the number of young men annually reaching the voting 
age being estimated between forty and fifty tliousand. 

It was well-known that there would be quite a number of 
anti-Tilden delegates in the B,oeteSfer State Convention, 
(and I may here state that John 0. Jacobs, of Brook- 
lyn, was also the presiding officer of this State Conven- 
tion) ; and it was perhaps the hope that there might be 
another bolt, and thus an accession to his camp, that in- 
duced John Kelly to select the same City for holding his 
"powwow." But it is said that lightning never strikes 
twice in the same place ; and there was no bolt, although 
in what was presumed to be a test vote in the Kegnlar Con- 
vention, the anti-Tildenites were found to number eighty; 
and when the delegates to the Cincinnati Convention were 
chosen, in the Kegnlar Convention, it was known that at 
least ten of the seventy chosen were anti-Tilden ; but as the 
"unit" rule and cast-iron resolutions were adopted by the 
Convention, had there been three times as many anti- 
Tildenites among the delegates, they would not have 
counted. One resolution read as follows : 

Resolved, That, in case any attempt should be made to dismember 
or divide the delegation by contesting the seats of a portion of the dele- 
gates ; and any of the delegates appointed by this Convention shall 
countenance such attempt by assuming to act separately from the 
majority of the delegation appointed by this Convention, orto enter the 
National Convention separately from such majority, or should fail to 
co-operate with such majority, the scats of such delegates shall be 
deemed to be vacated. 

Shortly after convening, the Kelly (anti-Tilden) Conven- 
tion had adopted a resolution asking for a conference with 



594 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 



I' 



i 



the Regular Convention " with a view to securing an united 
* delegation to Cincinnati," and appointed a Committee of five 
^ to act in such conference. When this communication from 

the Kelly Convention was presented to the other assemblage, 

it was referred to the Committee on Resolutions, which 

reported as follows : 

Unsolved, That the Chairman of this Convention, he requested to reply- 
to the communication signed hy John B. Haskin and others, and to 
assure him that this Convention reciprocates every expression of a 
desire for the union of the Democratic party of this State, and are 
persuaded that the deliberative vrisdom of the National Convention will 
result in such action as will secure the triumph of the Democratic party 
in the State of New York at the ensuing Presidential election. 

But when this I'esolution was adopted and a Committee 
sent to deliver it to the Kelly Convention (at which B«rv1d 
Dudley Field acted as presiding officer,) it was found that, 
tired of waiting for, and not expecting, a favorable response 
to their request for a conference, the anti-Tildenites had 
proceeded with the regular business of their Convention, 
and had adjourned sine die. The Regular Convention, 
having already virtually concluded its business before mak- 
ing any response to the pacificatory resolution, then also 
adjourned sine die. 

When the proceedings at the National Democratic Con- 
vention, held at Cincinnati, on June 22, 1880, opened, the 
Democratic rupture in New York State still existed, and 
while seats in the Convention were accorded by the National 
Committee to the delegates of the Regular State Convention, 
when the clerk's roll-call of delegates had reached "New 
York," credentials from the Kelly or Rump Convention 
were presented, and duly referred to a Committee on Cred- 
entials. In this Committee, after a courteous hearing 
during a recess of the Convention, a motion to award seats 
is that body to the regular or sitting members, received 
every vote except one — a member who was in favor of a 
division of the delegates, and who stated he would present 



TAMAf ANY OUT IN TIIK COM). SflS 

.1 inliiority re])in-t. Tlieii, on niolion of Aliniiii S. Hewitt, 
i t was : 

" licKolred, That tl»e Kelly lU'k'gation from New York l)e given si-als 
in the hall, in the rear of the body of the Convention, with the condition 
that they be debarred from any jiarlicipatioii in the jtrelitninary pro- 
ecediuic^." 

The iiiiiioi-ity of tlii' Coiiiiiiitteo on Credentials )-ej)orted 
in favor of tiivino; to tlie New York deleii-ates from the 
Regular Coiiventiou fifty votes and to the delegates from 
the Kelly Convention twenty votes. 

Botli reports being presented, the Convention assigned 
twenty minutes to the sitting delegates, and forty minutes 
to the contestants, for debate, when Judge Amasa J. Parker, 
Judge "Westbrook, and Gov. Hubbard, of Texas, spoke in 
favor of the minority, and Col. John R. Fellows and Rufus 
W. Peckham advocated the majority report. The vote was 
'* ayes " 205^, " nays " 477. The question on the adoption 
of the majority report was then carried by a viva voce vote, 
amid much cheering from the large assemblage. 

Permanent organization being duly comj^leted, Judge 
Jloadley of Ohio, temporary Chairman, gave place to Gov. 
Stevenson, of Kentuckv, as jtermanent Chairman, and soon 
the Convention was declared in order to receive nomina- 
tions for the office of President of the United States. 
After the formal presentation of names of candidates, 
a ballot was had with the following result: Gen. Hancock, 
of Pennsylvania, 171 votes; Thomas Bayard, of Delaware, 
lo3i ; Payne, of Ohio, 81 ; Ex-Senator Thurman, of Ohio, 
68^; Judge Field, of California, 65; Morrison, of Illinois, 
62 ; Thomas A. Hendricks, of Indiana, 50:V ; S. J. Tilden, 
of New York, 38 ; Gen. Ewing, of Ohio, 10 ; Horatio 
Seymour, of New York, 8 ; Samuel J. Randall, of Penn- 
sylvania, 6 ; Avith complimentary votes for several other 
gentlemen. 

In explanation of this vote, it should be stated that, it 



S&6 THIRTY YEARS <W NEW TORIv POLITICS.. 

having been asserted, at a caucus of the New York 
delegation, by Daniel Manning, then Tilden's right hand 
man, that Tilden was not a candidate, and it having been 
intimated by William C. Whitney, another right bower of 
Tilden, that the Governor would be pleased if his friends 
would support Payne, of Ohio, on motion of Whitney, 
it was then resolved that the New York delegates cast their 
seventy votes on the first ballot for that gentleman. This, 
being translated, meant : " Cast your votes for Payne till 
we see how the cat jumps; and then— why, wait till we 
hear from Tilden ! " It w^as plain to everyone that all this 
was another of the sly dodges of Tilden — not an avowed 
candidate, but wanting the nomination, if there was a 
ghost of a chance to get it ! 

After the announcement of the first ballotuig, the Con- 
vention by unanimous vote took a recess until the next 
morning. In the meantime, the news of the proceedings 
of the Convention had reached New York, and on the 
Herald bulletin appeared the following : 

"The Tammany men have been allowed seats on the floor of the 
Convention, but will have no voice in the proceedings." 

" Allowed to sit on the floor, is it ? " commented a son of 
Erin, as he gazed on the poster. " Why didn't they give 
them chairs to sit on ? That's a divil of a v»^ay to use the 
Boss." 

Speculation w^as rife as to what was going to be the next 
move — whether Kelly and his adherents would return to 
New York in a huff, before the adjournment of the Con- 
vention, or keep still and ambuscade its nominee, or what ? 
"What have they got to stay there for?" remarked an 
ardent friend of Tilden, discussing the situation in New 
York. '■'• They have been snubbed, terribly snubbed by 
the Convention, as they deserved to be. Tilden has played 
a sharp game, and betting is three to one that he'll receive 
the nomination. He is assured already of 182 j votes and 



TILDF.N TIIKOWS UP TIIF. SrONCJE. .7J7 

only wants Go] to ^ivo liim the required two-thirds vote 
of the Convention."' And equally oontident were most of 
Tilden's friends in the metropolis. 

During the evening recess of the Convention, the regu- 
lar delegates from New York State had anotlier caucus. 
Those who had been secretly engineering Tilden's campaign 
had doubtless connnunicated to him the result of the 
ballot that had been taken, as well as the generally unsatis- 
factory outlook. When the caucus assembled, a feeling of 
great uneasiness pervaded its members — at least thirty-four 
of whom were now more than satisfied that, however much 
they might respect "the Governor," it would bo an act of 
madness for him to force himself upon an unwilling Con- 
vention. Under the '* unit rule," however, these thirty- 
four delegates were entirely at the mercy of the majority 
(the other thirty-six). But the anxiety of the caucus 
was soon relieved; for a letter froni Tilden. M-hich had 
been held in escrow by one of his most intimate friends, 
Chas. F. McLean (now a Supreme Court Judge) was 
produced, dated several days previously, which, while 
thanking his friends throughout the State for their inter- 
est in his behalf, requested that, "if Iiis name were used in 
the Convention in connection with the nomination for 
President, it should l)e immediately withdrawn." To say 
that this was " glad tidings of great joy " to more than 
seven-eighths of the entire delegation would be no exag- 
geration, and a sense of intense relief was generally 
manifested. Upon reassembling, after a recess of ten min- 
utes for general consultation, the following resolution of 
regret was unanimously adopted : 

liesoh'ed, That with a sense of profound gratitude for his great ser- 
vice to the country and to tlie Democratic part}', and of unqualified 
admiration of liis character and ambition, this delegation has received 
with deep regret the impressive declination by Governor Tilden to be 
a candidate for renomination and re-election to the Presidency of the 
United States. 



59S THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

JV^r. Tilden, liaving now witlidrawn in earnest, there was 
no longer any use for the name of Payne, of Ohio, 
whose name was also withdrawn, and Hon. Samuel J. Ran- 
dall, of Pennsylvania, was then adopted as the choice of 
the New York delegation for President. 

The news of Tilden's action spread like wild-fire through 
Cincinnati, and if the Tammany warriors had had any 
previous idea of ''vamosing the ranche,"' now that the 
Boss had gained another negative victory in the withdrawal 
of Tilden from the field, they determined to stay in 
Cincinnati as long, at least, as their "fire water" held 
out. Many were the " scalp dances " enjoyed that night 
by New York's " unterrified "; and before the majority 
of the delegates to the Convention retired to their 
couches, the question of the nomination had been settled. 
Gen. Hancock had been voted for as a candidate in 
the Presidential Con-wention of 1868. Although one of 
the ablest fighters on the Union side during tlie Civil 
War, he was an especial favorite in the South because of 
his recognition, while in charge of the State of Louisiana, 
of the supremacy of civil over military law. The with- 
drawal of Tilden thus gave impetus to a Hancock boom, 
and it " grew by what it fed on." 

Upon the assembling of the Convention next morning, 
the probable result was easily discernible in the general dis- 
play of Hancock badges and medals. Among the peddlers 
on the side-walk leading to the Convention, no other em- 
blems were in demand ; and every one in'the crowded hall 
was eager for the Chairman to be seated, and the opening 
prayer to be got through with, so that the delegates could 
get to work. The second balloting was ordered, and, 
while the delegates from New York and other States re- 
corded their votes as agreed upon in their caucuses, by the 
time the alphabetical roll-call of the clerk had reached 
|*ennsylvarjja — the State which had placed Gen, Hancock 



KELLV8 HASTY JUMP ON THE llANCOlK TRAIN. 509 

in iiomiMati(^u - and aniiotiiici'il its ]>ivfi'ren('e, oiiouu^li votes 
Imd already ])i'on rccoi-di'd lor Hancock to sccMirc his nomi- 
nation. Tlien followed the nsual stampede and clian^-es in 
Ids favor, until it became tlie Cluiirman's duty to announce 
that "■ (rcneral Winiield Scott Hancock was the unanimous 
nominee of the Democracy, in Xational Convention assem- 
bled, for the otKco of President of the United States." It 
■was well stated that " only the war of cataracts and the 
crash of worlds," combined, could give a suggestion of the 
wild enthusiasm displayed in the Convention hall when the 
nomination of Hancock was announced; in the midst of 
which the band played " Praise God from Whom All Bless- 
ings Flow." and the artist who had charge of the immense 
organ joined with magnificent effect in rolling and swelling 
the joyous choral. More than half an hour of incessant 
cheering, hand-shaking, waving of banners, and the use of 
every other possilde method of demonstrating joy and glad- 
ness ensued before quiet was restored. Then followed 
complimentary speeches by representatives from almost 
every State. Mr. Breckenridge, of Kentucky, was just 
concluding a very telling and patriotic address when his 
eye caught a vision of the burly form of his old Con- 
gressional friend, John Kelly, wdio, with Amasa J. 
Parker, Augustus Schell, George C. Green and Amos 
North, was standing at the rear end of the aisle, waiting an 
opportunity to come forward ; and, w^ith the remark, " I 
^'ield the floor, Mr. Chairman, to Hon. John Kelly, of New 
York," the Kentucky orator took his seat, amid vociferous 
cheering. Kelly and his associates had been appointed 
by the anti-Tilden delegation to communicate to the Chair- 
man their hearty acquiescence in the nomination of Gen. 
Hancock. This was very adroit and timely action for 
Tammany Hall, which had been declared from the high- 
est possible political source, a National Convention, an 



600 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

outside organization, doomed for a time to " wear sack- 
cloth and ashes," 

As Kelly and his associates slowly made their way 
along the crowded aisle up to the platform, the l^and 
struck up the still popular war melody of " We're Coming, 
Father Abraham, One Hundred Thousand Strong," and 
the whole audience, excepting the Regular New York dele- 
gation, rose, cheered, and waved hats, fans and handker- 
chiefs. As soon as they reached the platform the Chairman 
heartily greeted them, and introduced John Kelly to the 
assemblage, with the remark tliat " the National Convention 
had that day united the great Democracy of New York." 

Kelly stood for a few minutes, perfectly calm, while 
the hall was in an uproar of good feeling, and then, in 
a clear, sonorous voice, said : 

"Gentlemen of the Convention, your Chairman has told you that, by 
your action to-day, in nominating Gen. Hancock, you have united the 
Democracy of the State of ISTew York. (Shouts of applause.) He has 
told you truly. While I and my brethren on the right (referring par- 
ticularly to the Irving Hall delegation from New York City) have been 
fighting 'each other politically for the last five years, they will no doubt 
agree with what I am going to say— let past differ noes be banished 
from our midst. (Great applause.) I am not going to speak to you now 
of what has occurred since we came to the City of Cincinnati. I have 
nothing in the world to sayagaiust what has been the action of the Con- 
vention, in relation to the organization which I, in part, represent. Let 
all that pass away, I promise the Convention in my humble way, and 
with my poor services,, to do all in my power, from this day forth 
until the day of election, to help elect the Democratic ticket. (Ap- 
plause and three cheers for New York.) And now, let me repeat to my 
friends here oil the right, from the State of New York (turning to them) 
let us once and for all take each other by the hand, and say this in 
common— that we have a nobler duty to perform than to be fighting 
each other politically h\ our own State. (Applause.) Let us unite ; let 
us look on each other kindly and favorably ; and when we act together, 
united as we must be, let me pledge to the Convention that there can 
be no question whatever as to the result. (Prolonged applause.) 

Loud calls were then made for Col. John E. Fellows, of 
New York, orator-in-chief of the Irving Hall or Til den 



REJOTCTN'C OVFi: A REPENTANT BOSS. fifll 

organization. lie ]iroposcd to speak from his scat, as he 
felt too ill to make a platform sj)eech ; hut the Coiiveiitiori 
loudly cried out ''Platform! platform!" and he was 
compelled to obey the persistent request. As lie approached 
the chairman's desk, he encountered Kelly, and thov 
i:;raspe(l each other's hands, the entire assend)lage (this time 
including all the Tildcu delegation from New York State) 
rising to give expression to its gratification, b}' three ringing 
cheers and a rousing '' tiger." Col. Fellows, after returning 
thanks, and apologizing for his almost worn-out condition, 
and the huskiness of his voice, said : 

"Gentlemen of the United States, your action to-day has been 
superb. You have wiped out all differences existing in the ranks of 
the Democratic party in our State. You have healed all dissensions. 
Wc may march under the division banners of diflerent Generals, but 
we shall march to one battle-tleld to fight one common foe." (Great 
applause.) "Henceforth that man is our friend who best assists in 
carrying that banner (pointing to a Flancock flag, which had just been 
displayed back of the Chairman's seat) to victory; he is our enemy, and 
only he, who lags in his duty in that respect. (Enthusiastic cheering. ) 
But you have done more, aye, infinitely more ; you have strangled by 
your strong hands to-day the giant of discord and strife which has 
dominated our great country. The North and the Sou'h now clasp 
hands in no unmeaning ceremony, and Hancock shall hear again the 
roar of the Hampton gun (Gen. Wade Hampton, of South Carolina, a 
leading Southern General during the Civil "War, had just been address- 
ing the Convention) in friendly strife. (Loud applause.) All over this 
land, by the success of our ticket, will come the return of fraternal 
concord, of brotherly love, of the olden glow. You have restored us to 
a common Union. Gentlemen, upon the stricken and impoverished 
States of the South, upon the graves where our dead repose and i:i 
the homes where the living mourn, there shall fall a benediction as 
though it were descended direct from God — the benediction of a just, 
perpetual, enduring peace. (Applause.) My tired voice admonishes 
me that I must talk no more to-day. I shall only add to what I have 
said that New York has but one rjsponsc to make to Democratic nomi- 
nations — she gives De:nocratic majorities. (Cheers.) With Hancock as 
our banner-bearer we shall m.rch through that State as though 
we were sweeping it with a tornado ! " 

Again tlie immense assemblage arose, and loined in three 



eofi THIRTY YEAES OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

hearty cheers for the State of New York, in the midst of 
wliich demonstration, Carter Harrison, of Chicago, 111., led 
John Kelly to the Chairman's desk, and there Kelly and 
Fellows publicly proclaimed their friendship, by shak- 
ing hands warmlj', the spectators continuing their cheering 
with all their might, while the band struck up " Auld Lang 
Syne," and the audience joined in singing the appropriate 
air. 

After this second grand demonstration of the day was got 
through with, ex-Governor Wm. II. English, of Indiana, 
was nominated by acclamation for the Vice-Presidency, 
amid general rejoicing ; and in less than three hoars after 
the adjournment of the Convention, at three o'clock, p.m., 
more than three-quarters of the delegates to the Convention 
had settled their hotel bills and were en route to their 
respective homes. 

The delegates in the special political trains from Cincin- 
nati reached New York — rival trains they started out, but 
" two hearts beat as one " when they returned — in the best of 
spirits (that is to say, as good as could be got at five dollars a 
gallon), and the enthusiasm for Hancock was immense, 
surpassing even that which had been shown in New York for 
Greeley, the day after his nomination for President. Li the 
exuberance of their joy over the reconciliation which had 
taken place and which had made them once more feel like 
members of the Democratic party, and no longer "wander- 
ing Willies," the Tammany braves had secured, in Cincin- 
nati, a "real live Indian," and brought him to New York. 
He was a tall, muscular fellow, about six feet three inches 
in height, and built in proportion (another Thomas J. 
Brennan, in size), their intention being to use him as a 
frontispiece to processions during the election campaign. 
This Indian had proven a sort of " white elephant " to the 
Tammany delegates, on their way from Cincinnati, as he 
nearly cleaned out the restaurant at every stopping-place en 



KEprRi.icAN snu'Kisr. pakty at ciiicaijo. (vn 

route, and as he was too tall, or rather too long, to sleop in 
the " five foot ten " berths of the sleeping cars, he had to 
1)0 contented with the " privileges of the floor," as had his 
'" big Chief," Kelly, at the Cincinnati Convention. 

The result of this Convention ended Tilden's politi- 
cal career. But he was not the only gentleman with " a 
bee in his bonnet," who partook of "knock-out drops" in 
the Presidential canvass of ISSO, Two very prominent 
statesmen on the Republican side also came to grief at 
about the same time. The Republican National Conven- 
tion was held — or, rather, began its sessions — at Chicago, 
on the second day of June. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, who 
had served two terms as President, was, unfortunately for 
himself, surrounded l)y as corrupt a set of political scoun- 
drels as ever walked in shoe leather. Yearning to be kept 
in office, these vultures believed they could best succeed in 
their desires by constantly pushing Gen. Grant to the front 
for a third term. James G. Blaine had checkmated their 
efforts in 1876, and brought about the nomination of 
Rutherford B. Hayes. Under the leadershij) of Roscoe 
Conkling and the " Old Guard," as he styled the army of 
Grant's office-holders whom he had at his back, a third Presi- 
dential term was demanded for the successful commander 
of the Union armies. Mr. Blaine was also an aspirant for 
the Presidency, as were Secretary John Sherman, Senators 
Edmunds and Washburn and Secretary Windom. Senator 
Conkling, of New York, a very able Congressman and 
adroit politician, vain as a peacock, a Czar in arrogance, and 
in his Bossing propensities " out-Heroding Ilerod," was the 
recognized Grant leader. Assuming to be commander-in- 
chief of the entire Republican party, he undertook to ride 
rough-shod over everybody in his eagerness and determina- 
tion to get a renomination for Gen, Grant. It required 
four days, after the Republican assemblage had got together 
in Chicago, before matters were properly fixed to com- 



604 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

mence balloting, and then it required three days more, and 
thirty-seven ballots, before a conclusion was reached. There 
were 756 votes in this Convention, and, as a majority rule 
governed their proceedings, only 379 votes were necessary 
to secure a nomination. On the first ballot, Grant started 
off with 304: votes, Blaine with 284:, and the remaining 
votes were divided between Sherman, Edmunds, Washburn 
and Windom. On the second ballot a delegate named W. 
A. Grier, from the Eleventh District of Pennsylvania, cast 
his vote for James A. Garfield, of Ohio, and, pleased with 
the round of applause which greeted his seeming audacity 
and independence, he was a solitary follower of Gar- 
field for twelve successive ballotings. Then he quit, prob- 
ably to " go and take something," or because he shrank 
from hazarding the proverbial "unlucky thirteen." For 
thirty-three ballotings Grant and Blaine held substantially 
the same number of votes with which they started off ; on 
the thirty-fourth ballot Grant reached 309, while Blaine's 
vote receded five, being only 279. 

Conkling was now jubilant, believing that the hour of 
triumph, for which he had been calmly waiting, had come 
at last. The close of the next (thirty-fifth) ballot showed 
another gain for Grant. He had now 312. But when 
Wisconsin, the last State on the roll, was called, she cast 
most of her vote for Garfield, following the example of 
Mr. Grier who had again on this ballot returned to " his 
first love." Just before the vote of Wisconsin was an- 
nounced, Conkling, much fatigued from his arduous work 
during the Convention, reclined in his seat, his neck band- 
aged with a handkerchief, in a yawning condition, from 
which he was aroused for a moment by the cheers which 
came from the gallery at Garfield's unexpected gain ; but, 
with a sneer, as though used to coquetry of that kind in a 
Convention, Conkling again let his head repose on his 
shoulder as if in restful mood. After the announcement of 



4^^i^^ 



^ 







(Kedrawn from Harper's Weekly. By permission. Copyright, 1SH8, hy Harper & Umthers.) 
ROSCOE CONKLTNG. 



GARFIELD'S UNEXPECTED TKIIMI'II. COS 

tin's ballot, Garfield, for whom seventeen votes were de- 
elared, ro>e ti» a point of order. '• ^ly point of order," said 
lie, in re])ly to tlio (^hairinairs in(piiry into the y)nrposc of 
his risiiii;, " is that no State has a right to cast its vote for 
niiv i)ersun as a nominee without that person's consent. So 
1 wish to say to those who have voted for me, that I refuse 
to consent to he a candidate for the nomination." *' The 
gentleman has not stated a question of order," the Chairman, 
Senator Hoar, replied ; " and no person havin<i; received the 
innnber of votes re(|uired for a choice, another ballot will 
be taken." 

On the next (thirty-sixth) ballot, Indiana gave twenty- 
seven votes to Garfield, and at the announcement of the 
completed ballot, Garfield w^as found to have fifty votes. 

Again Garfield got up, and protested against having 
votes cast for him without his consent. The Chair, however, 
directed the clerk to proceed with the next ballot. The 
crisis had how come. Word had been sent by Blaine to his 
friends to '" nominate Garfield "; AYashburne, Sherman and 
AVindom joined the combination ; and when the result of 
the thirty-seventh ballot was given, it was found that Grant 
had still 306 "solid men to the front," but Garfield had 399, 
Blaine 42, Windom 5 and f>Jierman 3. 

This result took the Convention by storm, and among the 
friends of Blaine, Sherman, Edmunds, "Washburne and 
"Windom there was great rejoicing. They had played their 
couj) d'etat with success. Every one of them had won a 
a victory in knocking-out Conkling and Grant ; while Conk- 
ling, though .shockingly disappointed at not securing a vic- 
tory for his favorite candidate, of which he was over-con- 
fident from the opening ballot, yet was so happy over 
Blaine's failure to carry off the prize, that he, too, joined in 
the general jubilee. The idea may also have entered his 
mind that, with both Grant and Blaine now in the dust, he 
himself might " bob up serenely " the next time. Be this 



606 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

as it may, although defeated, he had a following of 306 
Stalwarts, and he was too skilful a politician to lose the 
chance of scoring a point. So, when quiet enough was 
restored to resume business in the Convention, he :id 
dressed the Chairman, sajing that, inasmuch as James A. 
Garfield, of Ohio, had received a majority of the votes cast 
by delegates in the Convention, he moved that his nomi- 
nation be made unanimous, which motion was carried by a 
tumultuous viva-voce vote, and then, after nominating 
Chester A. Arthur, of New York, for Yice-President, the 
Convention adjourned sine die. 

Thus Tilden and Grant, both of whom felt sure of carry- 
ing off the Presidential nomination — the former because 
having been cheated of his election in 1876, he believed the 
people would insist upon his being vindicated ; and the 
latter because every office-holder of the Federal Govern- 
ment, under the inspiration of Conkling, had been planning 
and working for a third term for him from the time that 
he gave place in the "White House to his successor, 
Hayes — were pushed aside, and two gentlemen, neither 
of whom had made a visible effort in that direction, had 
each carried off a prize. 

You doubtless know the result of the election ; how a 
majority of the Electoral votes were cast in favor of 
Garfield, and how, on July 2, 1881, or four months after 
his inauguration as President, he was assassinated by a 
fanatic named Guiteau— being the second Chief Executive 
of the United States who, wnthin a period of sixteen years, 
was ruthlessly cut down in the noon of his usefulness. In 
their platform, the Democrats had declared in favor of " a 
tariff for revenue only," wdiich w-as interpreted by the busi- 
ness men of the country (who had experienced nearly seven 
years of depression and disaster resulting from the panic of 
1873) to mean " free trade," and consequently another long 
disturbance of commerce and traffic, Of two evils the 



1 



VICTOR BOW^ TO Tllli liEPl^BlJCAN 6099. ftor 

peoi)]e clioso wliat tln'v tliouj^lit \vas tlio lesser one, and 
surrendered the country onee more to the tender mercies 
of the Ile]>uhlieaii ]):u-ty. 

As ail evidence of Conklini^'s acknowledged })o\ver in the 
Repuhlicau oroanizatiou at tlie time referred to, although 
defeated in the realization of his hopes in the National 
" Convention spoken of, and to show that 1iq was still 
respected as the recognized champion of the Stalwart or 
Grant faction, Garfield, a delegate to the Convention and 
its choice for President, felt himself compelled to step over 
to Conkling's seat, hat in hand, and humbly request him to 
name one of his personal friends for Yice-President. Hence 
came Chester A. Arthur, the Convention's nominee for that 
position. And when Garfield visited New York City, on 
his tour as a candidate, be found it necessary to knock at 
the door of Boss Conkling, in the Fifth Avenue Hotel, 
and beg him to bring bis friend Gen. Grant to Garfield's 
hotel, " some pleasant evening," and make tbeir own terms. 



LETTER XLVIII. 

Reminiscence of an Important Political Event— Slavery 
AND Politics in Ante-Bellum Times— Vindictiveness op 
a Presidential Boss— Plucky Fight for Popular 
Sovereignty — Fate op Senators Stephen A. Douglas and 
David C. Broderick— Concentrated Effort of an Ad- 
ministration TO Crush John B. Haskin— Triumph of Free 
Speech over Partisanism— The Wrongs of Daniel E. 
Sickles and How he Avenged Them. 

My dear Dean: 

The reference, in a recent letter, to ex-Governor Wm. H. 
English, of Indiana, as the Democratic Vice-Presidential 
candidate in the canvass of 1880, brings to my mind an im- 
portant event in our political history, in which he took part. 
While a member of the House of Representatives, in 
1853, English very actively co-operated with Senator 
Stephen A. Douglas, of Illinois, in the passage of a bill to 
permit the organization of the Territories of Kansas and 
Nebraska into States, a provision of which Bill repealed 
what was then known as the " Missouri Compromise " of 
1850, under which Missouri, as a slave State, was admitted 
to the Union, the extension of slavery to the Territories 
named was prohibited, and as a compromise there was to 
be no interference with slavery in the then slave States. 
The real meaning of this measure was that the Territories 
would always remain Territories, and the Southern States, 
having a controlling vote in Congress, would remain 
masters of the situation. 

At first, the action on the part of Douglas and English 
was bitterly denounced in the non-slave-holding States. 
The anti-slavery element in those States failed to recognize 

60S 



FREE-SOIL AND I'OrULAK SOVEI^EICNTY. 009 

the statesmansliii) of the lueasiu-e, which afterwards foniied 
the issue upon which the Deinoeratie aiul Republican ])ar- 
ties became arrayed against each other. The provision of 
the Kansas and Nel)raska Bill, to which exception was taken 
in the non-slave-holding States, read as follows : 

" The Missouri Compromise, beina: inconsistent with the principle of 
non-intervention by Congress witli sliivery iu the Slates and Territories, 
as recognized by the Legislation of 1850, is hereby declared inoperative 
and void ; it being the true intent and meaning of this Act, not to legis- 
late slavery into any Territory or State, nor to exclude it therefrom, 
but to leave the peoj>le perfectly free to form and regulate their do- 
mestic institutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution 
of the L'nitttl States."' 

By urging the doctrine of State rights, Douglas induced 
the Senators from the Southern States to vote for his bill, 
and it became a law. In furtherance of the object he had 
in view, that of popular sovereignty, Mr. English had se- 
cured the passage through the House of Representatives on 
the seventeenth day of February, 1857, of a bill, entitled 
" A Bill to Establish Popular Sovereignty in Kansas, and 
to Enable the People thereof to Protect Themselves Against 
Invasions and Frauds, and Constitute a Government for 
Themselves." But, when the Bill reached the Senate, by a 
vote of thirty (twentj'-two of which came from the slave 
States and eight from the free States) to twenty (eighteen 
from the free States and two from slave States) it was 
defeated. 

Then the pro-slavery element in Kansas, assisted by the 
influence of the Administration, managed to have a State 
Convention called at Lecompton, Kansas, at wdiich a Con- 
stitution was adopted which could be construed to ])ermit 
slavery to be introduced into that State ; and, in March, 
1858, the pro-slaver}' element in the United States Senate 
succeeded in passing a bill through that body, by a vote of 
thirty -three to twenty-tive, for the admission of Kansas as a 
State under the aforesaid Lecompton Constitution. James 



610 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Buchanan, President at that time, made this an Adminis- 
tration measure, and it received the votes of all Democrats 
in the Senate save two, David C. Broderick (an old JSTew 
Yorker,) of California, and Stephen A. Douglas, of Illi- 
nois. Senator Crittenden, an old-line Whig, of Kentucky, 
endeavored to secure the passage of a substitute for this 
bill, providing that the Lecompton Constitution be sub- 
mitted to the people of Kansas at once, and if approved, 
the President to admit Kansas as a State, by proclamation; 
if rejected, the people to call a Convention and frame a 
Constitution ; the substitute making special provision against 
those frauds at election which, it was understood, had charac- 
terized the success of the delegates to the Convention that 
had been held at Lecompton, at which the alleged Consti- 
tution had been framed. Mr. Crittenden's substitute was 
lost by "yeas" twenty -four, "nays" thirty-four. 

When the Senate Bill providing for the admission of 
Kansas reached the House of Representatives, Mr. Mont- 
gomery, of Pennsylvania, offered as a substitute the Bill 
which Mr. Crittenden had offered in the Senate. After 
considerable debate, the Crittenden-Montgomery substitute 
passed the House by a vote of one hundred and twenty to 
one hundred and twelve. Among the affirmative votes 
were included nineteen Democrats from tlie free States, 
who rebelled against the dictation of the President — ■ 
who brought all the influence of his Administration to 
defeat the measure. Of these independent Democrats, 
one was from California, five from Illinois, three from 
Indiana (one of whom was English), two from New York, 
(one of whom was John B. Ilaskin), four from Ohio, and 
four from Pennsylvania. The remaining 101 affirmative 
votes consisted of Republicans and what were called 
Fillmore Americans. 

These differences regarding the Kansas matter — the 
House having passed a substitute for the Senate bill — ne- 



BUCHANAN'S FUTILE BOSSISM. 6U 

eessitated the appoiutnient of ConfoiTiicc Comiiiittoes. But 
■when a motion to tliat elYect was iiuide in the House, Mont- 
gomery, of Pennsyhania, endeavored to resist it, and sought 
to induce the House to insist on its adherence to tlu; (.rit- 
tenden-Montgomery substitute, and when he called 
"■the previous question," English, very mncli to the surprise 
of the ITousc, moved to substitute for ]\rontgomery'8 mo- 
tion a resolution " that the House agrees to a Conference 
C^ommittee, and that a Committee of three be appointed by 
the Speaker." This action on the part of English, the 
Speaker being in afliliation \vith the Administration side 
of the question, excited much comment. There was great 
excitement in the House; and when the "ayes" and 
"nays" on the motion to appoint a Conference Committee 
were called, it was found that the vote was a tie, each having 
108. The Speaker then cast his vote in the affirmative, and 
English's motion was declared carried. A compromise bill 
was the result of the conference — a bill which pleased neither 
party, in fact, but which was agreed to by both Houses, pass- 
ing the Senate by a vote of thirty to twenty-two, and enough 
changes were made through the influence of the Adminis- 
tration, in the House, to secure a bare majority for the 
Bill proposed by the Conference Committee. But John 
B. Haskin, of New York, stood firm wdth Stephen A. 
Douglas and David C. Broderick, in opposition to having 
another inch of free soil trod by a slave. 

The resistance on the part of these three fearless Demo- 
crats to the pro-slavery edict of Buchanan had to be pun- 
ished. When the National Democratic Convention assem- 
bled, in 1860, to select a nominee for President, and, after 
a severe conflict, Stephen A. Douglas was declared the 
nominee, the Southern delegates seceded, held a Conven- 
tion at Louisville, Kentucky, nominated John C. Brecken- 
ridge, and thus rendered certain the election of Abraham 
Lincoln, the Republican iioiuiuee. The utter extinction of 



612 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK TOLITICS. 

slavery was an incident of the Civil War, wliicli soon fol- 
lowed the inauguration of Lincoln, and Senator Douglas 
died on the tliird day of June, 1861. Senator Broderick 
was, soon after, provoked to fight a duel wath a Southern 
fire-eater, Judge Terry, in California, and was killed. And 
a very desperate effort was made by Buchanan to administer 
" knock-out drops " to Haskin, at the ensuing Fall election. 
Ex-State Senator William Cauldwell, one of the few sur- 
vivors of those who participated in the very exciting elec- 
tion for Congressman which followed a determination of 
Westchester county citizens to sustain a Representative 
who had manfully done his duty, recently described to me 
the campaign which ensued. Eight or ten leading Demo- 
crats had a meeting for the purpose of discussing the situa- 
tion. As a result of this conference, it was resolved that a 
public reception, at the -close of his Congressional term, 
be extended to Haskin, at Morrisania Hall, located on 
Kailroad Avenue, near One Hundred and Sixty-seventh 
street, when the course which had been pursued by their 
Congressional Representative was unanimously approved, 
and a committee was appointed " to take such action as 
might be necessary to secure his return to Congress." 
AVord had been sent to all government officeholders in 
Haskin's district (comprising the counties of Westchester, 
Rockland and Putnam) that under no circumstances must 
he be permitted to receive a renomination for Representa- 
tive ; and the recipients of Administration bounty in the 
district were not slow in heeding the "mad dog" cry. The 
President had taken his stand with the pro-slavery side 
of Congress, and he felt in duty bound to subdue every 
rebel he could reach. The Administration could manage 
all the Custom House patronage and all the Postmasters' 
throughout the district, and their influence together with 
that of every other participant in Federal patronage was 
concentrated against Haskin. 



THTKnVTNi; I>()\VX THE (i.M'NTI.F.T. 61^ 

Tender such circumstaiu'os. it was of course (juitc apparent 
to the friends of Ilaskin tliat there- was no chance of 
his obtaining a nomiiuition in a Democratic Congressional 
Convention, which was certain to be under tlie control of 
the Administration. So it was determined to call a mass 
meeting of independent Democrats and all citizens who ap- 
jiroved of Ilaskin's course, to meet at Tarrytown, in 
Westchester county, in the month of June, 1858, " to take 
such action as might be deemed advisable to secure the 
nomination of a citizen to represent the Ninth Congres- 
sional District, in the House of Kepresentatives, who would 
|)ledge himself to resist the encroachments of slavery on the 
virtrin soil of Kansas." This announcement brought to- 
gether an assemblage of between three and four thousand 
citizens, a mass convention was organized, with otticers 
representing every town in the Congressional District. 
John W. Forney (a leading politician of Pennsylvania, 
and who was then the editor of a Washington as well 
as a Philadelphia daily paper,) made a very vigorous 
speech, lauding Ilaskin for his manly course ; letters from 
Senators Douglas and Broderick were read, which also 
highly commended him ; and a committee was appohitedto 
draft resolutions expressive of the sentiments of the meet- 
ing. No such gathering had ever before been seen in 
Westchester county, and the enthusiasm was sincere and 
fervid. After recess, the resolutions which had been pre- 
pared and which very appropriately expressed the sense of 
the gathering, were read, the last one recommending the 
nomination of John B. Ilaskin, then and there, as "the 
People's Candidate for Congress." This last resolution 
was vociferously applauded, and was adopted unanimously. 
Ilaskin was then sent for, and he made a very telling 
speech, acknowledging, in accepting the nomination, his 
realization of the fact that all the power, money and influ- 



614 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ence of tlie Administration would be used against liim, but 
promising to " win, or die." 

The canvass was a most exciting one. Probably nowhere 
else in the United States was so mu(;li interest taken in a 
Congressional contest. The Administration had secured, 
as an opponent of Haskin, Governeur Kemble, of Putnam 
county, a gentleman of vast wealth, and the owner of 
the most extensive foundries in the Union. His friends 
were given carte hlanche to " win the fight," and the old 
farmers of the three counties interested were more than 
surprised at the substantial inducements held out to them to 
exercise their right of suffrage — for Kemble. Under the 
advice of Horace Greeley, the Republican party placed no 
candidate in the field, leaving the issue a square one be- 
tween the people and the Administration, with all the 
j^atronage, the influence of " regularity," and a candidate 
" with a barrel " at his command, on the side of the latter. 

Haskin, as the nominee of the Democracy, at the pre- 
ceding Congressional election, had received a majority 
of more than two thousand, and he knew he had a desperate 
fight on hand. But, with two fast trotting ponies, a driver, 
and a barouche, he visited every nook and corner of every 
town in his district, talking whenever and wherever he 
could get fifty or sixty people together ; and when the polls 
were closed on election day, the ascertained result was so 
close that it was not until the canvass by the Boards of 
Supervisors of the three counties that the actual figures 
could be had and the winner positively determined ; and 
then it was announced that, in the counties of Rockland 
and Putnam, Kemble had received 1,009 majority over 
Haskin ; but, in Westchester county, Haskin received 1,022 
majority over Kemble ; and, for this thirteen majority 
over his opponent, Haskin received a certificate of elec- 
tion from the State Board of Canvassers. 

So you will perceive, my dear Dean, that our people. 



SHOOTING OF PHILIP BARTON KEY. 615 

when they get aroused in a good cause, almost iiivarial)ly 
l)ulverize Bossism wlieiiever and wherever it shows its 
liead; and, it would be well if some other people troubled 
with that complaint should, as Capt. Cuttle remarked, 
" make a note of it." 

John B. Ilaskin was quite a character in his day, lie 
made an able Hepresentative in Congress, but he evidenced 
no fondness for public office, lie seemed to take especial 
]deasure, however, in local controversies of any and every 
kind, and he was a terror to local politicians before the 
village of Fordham, in which he lived, became 2^ai*t and 
parcel of the metropolis. Commissioners of Highways who 
did not give all the attention he desired to the roads which 
led to his house ; Assessors who failed to place a little 
liigher valuation on his neighbor's property than on his ; 
Constables who did not pound every cow found trespassing 
on his pastures; in fact, every local official who did not fol- 
low his bidding in all things incident to his immediate sur- 
roundings, found in Ilaskin a disturber of his peace. He 
would call a public meeting on the shortest notice for the 
most trivial cause ; and his indulgence in invective, at these 
gatherings, may have been "equalled by some but sur- 
passed by none." But, aside from these peculiarities, he 
had some very good traits of character. He was nick- 
named by politicians "Tuscarora," and on almost all 
questions he was generally found on the side of the minor- 
ity, believing, with Mike Walsh, the eccentric New York 
politician, to whom I have referred, that " any dead fish can 
swim with the stream, but it takes a real live one to go 
against the current." 

One of Haskin's associates from this city, in the House 
of Representatives, was Daniel E. Sickles, formerly a 
State Senator, and afterwards private Secretary to James 
Buchanan, when Minister to England. He was elected 
to Congress the same year as was Haskin, in 1856, but, 



616 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

unlike that gentleman, he stood by the Administration in 
its pro-slavery fight, and had no trouble in securing a re- 
election in 1858. But, during his second term, he dis- 
covered an intimacy with his wife on the part of one in 
whom he confided, Philip Barton Key, of Baltimore, 
son of the man who wrote " The Star Spangled Banner." 
Key, at the time, was United States Attorney for the Dis- 
trict of Columbia. Sickles' devotion to business and poli- 
tics kept him a good deal away from his wife — a pretty 
Italian, young, attractive and fond of gaiety — and this threw 
her more into the society of Key than was good for her, 
he being permitted by Sickles to accompany her to almost 
every ball and reception. Upon his return home, one night, 
while his wife was at a reception at Willard's Ilotel, he 
found a note addressed to him, in which he learned the 
facts of his own dishonor. The note was unsigned, but 
was evidently written by some one who knew what he or 
she was writing about. He at once had the alleged facts 
investigated, and upon receiving incontrovertible evidence 
of their truth, he laid the statement before his wife, who 
at first denied everything, then stammered, then fainted. 
"When revived, she fell down on her knees, confessed all, 
and begged her injured husband to pity and forgive her. 
Meanwhile, Key, the cause of the misery in the Sickles' 
household, led his usual gay life, playing on the very edge 
of a volcano. He went on Friday night (the night after 
Sickles' discovery) with a lady to the theatre ; on Saturday, 
took another lady to Mrs. Kemble's readings ; and on Sun- 
day morning prepared to enjoy himself. He went to 
Willard's Hotel, after breakfast, and chatted with some 
friends ; then proceeded to the National Club House, op 
posite Sickles' home ; and at last went out on the street and 
waved his handkerchief under Mrs. Sickles' window. This 
was the signal that he wanted her to come to see him. He 
little thought, when he was making that signal, that the 



HOMICIDE JUSTIFIED BY THE JUKI. 617 

wonian he was making it for had confessed all about him 
to her husband, and was cryini^ with sliame, as if her heart 
would break; and little did he dream that, in less than an 
hour, there would be no such person living as Philip Barton 
Key. 

While the seducer was thus, on Friday and Saturday, 
whiling away his time, the injured husband was suffering 
torments, lie sent for two intimate friends, ]\[r. Butter- 
worth and Bobert J. Walker, U. S. Secretary of the 
Treasury, and told them his sorrow and his shaine, sobbing, 
this great strong man, as if his heart was breaking, when 
he showed them the written confession of his wife. After 
his friends left him, Sickles went out into the street, walk- 
ing in an excited manner, and, as he turned the corner to- 
ward his house, he observed Key making the signal for his 
wife which had been described to him in the letter; and 
as the betrayer and betrayed met, friend and husband, Key, 
knowing nothing of his danger, saluted Sickles ; but Sickles 
glared at him, and in a loud, firm voice, said : " Key, you 
scoundrel, you have dishonored ray house and you must 
die!" and drawing a pistol instantly fired at Key, who 
made a motion to insert his hand into a side pocket, as if to 
pull out a pistol, although it was ascertained afterward 
that it was only to get a chance to hurl an opera glass at 
Sickles. Key then seized Sickles by the collar of his coat, 
and made an effort to strike him with the opera glasses. 
Sickles struggled with Key for a second, got the collar of 
his overcoat out of his clutch, and fired again at Key, who, 
retreating backward, toward the Clul) House, staggered, 
fell partially to the ground, resting on one knee, when 
Sickles advanced and fired a third shot into his enemy, 
exclaiming again, as he fired, " You villain, you have dis- 
honored my house, and you must die ! " And Key did die. 
They carried him into the Club House, and in a short 



618 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

time liis dead body was lying ou the floor in a back room 
of the Club. 

Sickles made no attempt to escape ; was arrested, con- 
fined in a cell, and held for trial. Sickles' wife was driven 
nearly crazy by shame and remorse. She asked to see 
Sickles, but he refused to see her ; but when a clergyman 
visited him in his cell at midnight, and, on behalf of 
the woman who bore his name, begged him to return to 
her the wedding ring which he had taken from her finger 
after she had written the confession of her guilt, he at last 
relented, and returned the ring, but he broke it before 
doing so, and the wretched wife only got back a broken 
ring. 

The greatest sympathy was expressed for Sickles, who, 
after a lengthy trial, was pronounced by the jury " not 
guilty " of murder, the crime for which he was tried. The 
evidence brought out fully confirmed the guilt of Key ; 
and, on the ground that the exasperating facts had impelled 
Sickles to the commission of his deed in an hour of frenzy, 
he was acquitted ; and he received congratulations from all 
sides, from his many influential friends. At the opening 
of the Civil War, he raised a Brigade of five regiments, 
served with honor and distinction all through the war, in 
which he lost a leg, and was promoted for bravery to the 
rank of Major General. In 1869, he was made Minister 
to Spain, and afterwards held other civil positions, among 
which was that of Sheriff pro tem. in 1890 for the County 
of New York. And there is no more regular attendant at 
the Metropolitan Opera House, during the Opera season, 
in this City, than Major General Daniel E. Sickles, associate 
of the late John B. Haskin during the Administration of 
President James Buchanan. 



LETTER XLIX. 

Boss Kelly in Troubled Waters— Indignation Local and 
General Heaped Upon Him — Sectarian Fight Against 
William R. Grace in a Mayoralty Contest — Kelly's 
Motives Severely Criticised — How Mayor Cooper 
Untied an Aldermanic Deadlock — A Beheaded Boss's 
Vindictive Speech — Threatened Revolt in Ta3imany 
Against One-Man Power — How the First Mayor op 
Greater New York, Robert A. Van Wyck, Almost 
Ruptured Tammany Hall. 

My dear Dean : 

General Wintield Scott Hancock's defeat as Presidential 
candidate, in 1S80, brought on another season of grief to 
the Tammany Hall leader, John Kelly. I have shown 
how that gentleman, in the furtherance of his quarrel with 
Tilden, in 1876, l)oIted the renoraination of Mr. Tilden's 
friend, Gov. Lucius Robinson, in 1879, thus insuring the 
election of Alonzo B. Cornell, Republican, as Governor; 
and how, at the Democratic National Convention of 1880, 
he was, in consequence, " disciplined" ; and how he be- 
came penitent, craved forgiveness and was welcomed back 
as a co-worker in the Democratic phalanx, upon his assur- 
ance of earnestly and heartily supporting the nomination of 
Gen. Hancock, whose election with the undoubted support 
of all the Southern States and the then assured promise of 
the Electoral votes of the State of New York, was rejrarded 
as a certainty. The defeat of Gen. Hancock, following 
the great fraud perpetrated upon Mr, Tilden in the 1876 
canvass for President — and the later disaster caused only by 
the lack of about twenty-one thousand Democratic votes in 
the State of New York — was attended with not only bitter 

619 



620 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

disappointment, but with the belief that the defeat was 
due to treachery in the City of New York, John Kelly 
being the cause. 

In obedience to the promises made by the representatives 
of the then Kegular (or Irving Hall) Democracy and Tam- 
many Hall, at the National Convention in Cincinnati, the 
rival Democratic factions in the metropolis joined hands 
in local nominations, so as to present a united front in 
support of the Presidential candidate of the party. But 
while the Democrats, being thus united, felt confident of 
victory, their opponents, realizing that New York was the 
pivotal State in the Presidential contest, determined to con- 
centrate all their energies upon the reduction of the major- 
ities in the two Democratic strongholds, the cities of New 
York and Brooklyn. In this they were aided very materi- 
ally by John I. Davenport, the Federal Supervisor of Elec- 
tions, who bent all the autocratic powers of his position to 
harrassing and putting every possible obstacle in the way 
of Democratic voters, by arbitrary arrests designed to in- 
timidate citizens, many of whom, to avoid those tyrannical 
proceedings, availed themselves of any excuse to stay away 
from the polls; while it was a proven and unmistakable 
fact, that, both in New York and Brooklyn, thousands of 
illegal votes, cast by colonized negroes and others who 
could be spared from " perfectly safe " Eepublican States, 
and imported and lodged and fed at the expense of the 
" Garfield Election Fund," were permitted, through the 
help of this same Davenport, to be recorded in favor of the 
Eepublican Presidential ticket. 

Then it so happened that Wm. P. Grace, the Mayoralty 
nominee of the united Democracy, was a Koman Catholic, 
and, as at that time there was an uneasy feeling among 
religious sects regarding the public schools, and especially 
regarding the public school appropriation, lest it might be 
diverted to sectarian uses, the Republican leaders organized 



RELIGIOUS ANIMOSITIES AROUSED. 621 

51 religious war agaiust Grace ; and from the day of his 
nomination until the closing of the polls, no effort was 
spared by the Republican press as well as by the pulpit to 
array religious bigots in opposition to the Democratic 
nominee for Mayor. Moreover, the platform adopted by 
the Cincinnati Convention, that of " a tariff for revenue 
only," was interpreted by the business world to mean a 
rejection of all idea of protection and a further disturbance 
of a very much depressed condition of affairs, and this 
succeeded in creating " a business scare." Such were the 
conditions which the New York and Brooklyn Democ- 
racy had to face in the Hancock campaign ; and it was 
this combination of circumstances, not treachery on the 
part of John Kelly, which served to reduce the Democratic 
majority for Hancock in the metropolis, from an anticipated 
65,000 to only 37,877; while the majority for Garfield in 
the entire State was only 21,033 votes. 

It would, perhaps, have been more judicious, and would 
liave evidenced better political sagacity on the part of 
Mr. Kelly, to have avoided the possibility of a sectarian 
issue being brought into a Presidential contest, by selecting 
at that time some candidate other than Grace, who was, 
however, elected in spite of the ridiculous onslaught made 
against him. But that gentleman had been suggested and 
chosen solely on the ground of his fitness for a public trust. 
In the minds of intelligent citizens his religious views had 
nothing whatever to do with the administration of his office. 
And neither of the organizations responsible for his selec- 
tion felt that they could, with any dignity or self-respect, 
succumb to the scheming politicians and pulpit blather- 
skites who sought to drag religious animosities into a sim- 
ple New York municipal contest. 

It was deemed wiser to endure defeat than yield to 
bigotry, against which so many battles had had to be 
fought in times past, in the metropolis ; for it is the feeling 



622 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of every true American citizen that lie wlio stimulates 
people to bigotry is the worst enemy of his race and of the 
community in which he lives ; and when a party ventures 
upon such an outrage, as did the Rej^ublicans in the Mayor- 
alty canvass referred to, it should be resented, not acceded 
to by the people. 

But the election was a general disappointment ; and, as 
there was no hope of correcting this second capture of the 
Presidency through fraud — once by means of corrupt Re- 
turning Boards in the States of Florida and Louisiana, and 
then through hired repeaters and Federal interference with 
the rights of citizens in New York State — because the Con- 
gress to which such a question would be referred was 
largely Republican, a scapegoat was made of John Kelly, 
and he was denounced as the immediate cause of the 
political disaster. 

As a political leader John Kelly was not a decided suc- 
cess, except for John Kelly, and in this respect both he and 
his hete noir, Tilden, were much alike. Tilden used prom- 
inence in politics as a means to an end, the end being the 
pocket of Samuel J. ; for it brought him, as a lawyer, in 
contact with large railroad controversies, by means of which 
he managed to feather his nest very comfortably ; and 
Kelly always succeeded in making politics pay him hand- 
somely, but in a perfectly legitimate, official manner — not 
through the stock-jobbing, toll-gate dividends indulged in 
by other Bosses. After the election of Wm. 11. Wickham 
as Mayor, as a kindly remembrance for favors received, 
Kelly secured an appointment as City Comptroller. His 
term was to expire in December, 1880, and, as it was un- 
derstood that he held through Governor Cornell (for 
benefits extended in 1879) such a combination in the 
Board of Aldermen as would prevent a confirmation of his 
successor, should the then Mayor, Fdward Cooper, make 
such a nomination within three or four weeks of the close 



MAKING KELLY A SCAPEGOAT. 02:j 

of his olHcial tenn. many believed that it was a bargain to 
secure reappointment as Comptroller that induced Kelly to 
aofree to the Irvinii; Hall nomination of Wm. 11. Grace for 
Mayor. 

Be all that as it may, a scapegoat was needed to account for 
the defeat of General Hancock ; and, as the reign of Kelly 
as Boss had shown no marked evidence of benefit either to 
the metropolis or to Tammany Hall, and as he had begun 
to manifest on all occasions too much of that " one-man 
power'' which was his great characteristic, indications of 
a Tammany rebellion became manifest on all sides. In ad- 
dition to this, Kelly, who controlled two daily newspapers, 
the New York Star and the New York Evening Express, 
had got into a bitter personal controversy with both the 
Xew Y'ork Sun and New Y'ork Herald^ and, altogether, 
the Boss was in a bad way. It seemed as though nothing 
could save him from " the deep blue sea " — that he was a 
genuine if not an original Jonah, and would be treated 
accordingly. The following extract from an editorial in 
the New Y'ork Herald of November 5, 1880, evidences the 
feeling regarding him on the part of that journal : 

" The unrestrained wrath with which the indignant city Democracy 
assail ^Ir. Kelly, is the plain consequence of his defying public opinion 
by nominating a candidate for ]\Iayor for the selfish purpose of securing 
his own re-appointment to the Comptrollership. He wantonly sacrificed 
the Hancock ticket to his unscrupulous quest of local power. The 
Democracy here and elsewhere perfectly understand his perfidy, and 
they only await an opportunity for a reckoning. They intend to punish 
him and make an example of him as a warning to bolting renegades 
and traitors. * * * 

" Kelly's office of Comptroller is the keystone of the arch of tyranny 
he had plotted to establish. He relies on the permanent discord between 
Maj or Cooper and the present Board of Aldermen to throw into Mayor 
Grace's hands the appointment of a Comptroller for a new term of four 
years. Kelly's current term— to which he was appointed on the third 
of December, 1876, by Mayor Wickham, for whom he now has no word 
of ungrateful abuse too foul— will expire on the third of the coming 
December. Mayor Cooper and the Aldermanic majority which was 



6-;M thirty years of new YORK POLITICS. 

elected on the ticket that was headed with Mayor Cooper's name, in the 
municipal election of 1878, have power to oust him and agree upon a 
successor if, as is hoped, they will sacrifice personal jealousy to public 
duty and resume harmonious relations." 

To endeavor to appease the growing feeling of antagon- 
ism, Kelly called a meeting of the Tammany General 
Committee on Friday, November 5, to which he submitted 
a printed address, claiming that the defeat of Hancock was 
dne to wholesale colonization of Republican repeaters, and 
to the independent press in personal abuse concerning his 
management of the local ticket. Robert A. Yan Wyck, 
present Mayor of Greater New York, then a member 
of the Tammany General Committee, took exception to 
the address, and offered, as an amendment to its con- 
clusions, " that the defeat of Hancock Was owing to the 
mismanagement of the party leaders of this City." 

The occasion referred to presented the most extraordi- 
nary scene witnessed in Tammany Hall since Kelly had 
become " Boss," in 1872, and was regarded as an evidence 
that there were some few members of the Tammany 
organization who were not grovelling slaves. When Yan 
"Wyck offered his amendment, Kelly, who had been sit- 
ting like a sphinx up to that moment, turned his head 
to the left, in the direction of the bold and uncomprom- 
ising speaker, and seemed to feel as if an earthquake 
had occurred. He had been so long accustomed to sit 
still and hear his satellites trumpet the praise of their 
" honored leader," that it was something entirely novel for 
bim to hear his virtue and wisdom impugned. In stolid 
amazement he looked at Yan Wyck, whose voice rang 
like a clarion through the hall, and whose words and senti- 
ments provoked applause, despite the dense mass of opposi- 
tion against him. 

After the broadside of Van Wyck had been fired, it was 
evident that some of the big guns in the organization were 



CRUSHING REVOLT IN THE WIGWAM. 62^ 

necessary to change the effect of his fearless deiiunciation ; 
and Thomas F. Grady (a Tammany Demosthenes of tlie 
first order, now a State Senator) was sent to the pLatform, 
whence for nearly an hour he thundered forth a defence of 
Tammany Hall and John Kelly, eliciting rounds of ap- 
plause. Ex-Congressman Wm. K. Koberts, celebrated as 
another " honored leader '' orator, together with James M. 
Lyddy, who worshipped the very ground John Kelly trod 
on, and Ex-Governor Dorsheimer, M'ho was then editor of 
the New York Star, with others, followed Grady in sup- 
port of the prepared address presented by Kelly, which 
was of course adopted with a " hurrah," and the Boss was 
satisfied. Ilis address had been approved. He had been 
"' vindicated." 

Both the Tammany Hall and the Irving Hall organiza- 
tions then appointed committees to investigate alleged 
colonization frauds ; and soon, in the hurly-burly of local 
politics, the Presidential defeat was forgotten. 

In the early part of December, Mayor Cooper began to 
make arrangements to secure the confirmation of the 
nominations for the lucrative and influential offices he had 
at his disposal It was understood that the Republicans in 
the Board of Aldermen were willing to make terms with 
him, but their terms were high. They wanted the Comp- 
trollership and the Presidency of the Tax Commission, 
claiming that their votes and position entitled them to 
two members of the Board of Apportionment. They 
thought also that they ought to have a representative 
in the Dock Board, and demanded a representative in the 
Park Commission, and claimed at least one of the long 
terms of Police Justices ; but signified their willingness to 
give up their claims in regard to Docks and Police Justices, 
and even Parks, for the nomination for Corporation Coun- 
sel, which they wanted for Elihu Root, who is still a 
power in Republican politics. Tlie Mayor did not attempt 



626 THIRTY YEARS O^ NEW YORK POLITICS. 

to disguise the fact that he was very anxious to supplant 
Kelly in the Comptroller's office, but proclaimed that 
he would under no circumstances give that office to the 
Republicans. Besides, he had become not a little alarmed 
in regard to making arrangements with any of the Alder- 
men or their representatives. A clause in the Charter of 
1873 made it a felony to enter into an agreement with them. 
Should he succeed in making such an arrangement with the 
Republicans, or with individual Aldermen, be had heard that 
Tammany Hall was ready to take action against him, under 
the section of the Charter which read as follows : 

Section 100. — Every person who shall promise, offer, or give, or 
cause, or aid, or abet in causing to be promised, offered or given, or 
furnish, or agree to furnish in whole, or in part, to any other person, to 
be promised, offered or given to any member of the Common Council, 
or any officer of the Corporation, or clerk, after his election or appoint- 
ment as such officer, member or clerk^ or before or after he shall have 
qualified and taken his seat or entered upon his duties, any moneys, 
goods, right of action, or other property, or anything of value, or any 
pecuniary advantages, present or prospective, with intent to influence 
his vote, opinion, judgment or action, on any question, matter, cause, 
or proceeding which may be then pending, or may by law at any time 
be brought before him in his official or clerical capacity, shall be deemed 
guilty of a felony, and shall upon conviction be imprisoned in a peni- 
tentiary for a term not exceeding two years, and shall be fined not ex- 
ceeding five thousand dollars, or both, in the discretion of the Court. 

The section provided similar punishment for the person 
proved guilty of receiving a bribe, consideration, or pe- 
cuniary promise ; but a person giving information was to be 
let off free. Kelly believed that the quoted section of the 
Charter would deter the Mayor from making a deal ; but 
he was worried over the fact that Mayor Grace had pub- 
licly proclaimed himself as an " independent," and that 
, he would bring a good deal of stubborn individuality with 
him into the Mayoralty chair, not expected by the powers 
that be ; and thus it was not a pleasant time for the Boss. 

It did not take Mayor Cooper many days after an alleged 



MAYOR COOPER'S COUP D'l^TAT. 627 

" secret conference " to make up his mind to oust Kelly. 
On Friday, Pec. 10, he transmitted to the Board of 
Aldermen his batcli of nominations, and to tlie dismay of 
the Boss the nominations were promptly confirmed. The 
Republican leaders had agreed to a change of base. They 
liad entertained designs of power and official patronage in 
the City vastly greater than they could gain by the co-opera- 
tion in filling official vacancies suggested to them bv the 
Mayor. They had expected to be able to pass through the 
Legislature a new City Charter ; but, after taking the con- 
census of the new Legislature, it was found that the anti- 
Conkling influence in the Senate would defeat that scheme. 
Hence they accepted what positions Mayor Cooper was 
pleased to give them, and their Aldermanic representatives 
voted for the Mayor's " slate." All the officials appointed by 
the Mayor on that Friday took the oath of office the follow- 
ing day, December 11, and Tammany Hall thus lost control 
of every Department in the City and County, except the 
office of Eegister; while anti-Tammanyites now had the 
Sheriff, the County Clerk, the Department of Public 
"Works, the Comptroller, and the Tax Department, besides 
claiming at least a neutralizing influence over the incoming 
Mayor. The new Board of Aldermen would consist of 
eight Tammany, seven anti-Tammany and seven Eepublican 
members — a very inviting condition of affairs for a deal, 
when desired. 

The day after Mayor Cooper's municipal coup d'etat, the 
Tammany Hall Committee on Organization was called to- 
gether to make arrangements for the holding of Primaries 
to elect a new General Committee for the ensuing year. 
This, of course, offered a good opportunity for Col. Wm. 
R. Roberts, Thomas F. Grady, General Spinola, Henry D. 
Purroy, ex-Coroner Woltman, Alderman Kirk, ex-Assem- 
blyman Holahan, and others to "honor" their leader again. 
Ex-Asserablyman Holahan, now President of the Board 



(528 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of Piihlic Improvements, was especially angry at Mayor 
('Ooper for turning the Boss out of office the day before. 
He said : " Let Edward Cooper, that infamous hypocrite, 
who occupies the Mayoralty chair, know that, after his be- 
trayal of the Democracy, he is no nearer Heaven, nor 
Samuel J. Tilden nearer the White House, than they were 
before ! " Gen. Spinola spoke of Mayor Cooper, Samuel 
J. Tilden, Andrew H. Green, and others, as " political har- 
lots." He eulogized Kelly as Comptroller, and said : " He 
is dearer to his party in this his seeming hour of trial than 
he ever was before. Kelly is not responsible for traitors 
like the four Tammany Aldermen who voted to confirm 
the Mayor's nominations. The Saviour of mankind could 
not protect himself from a Judas. But we can look out 
hereafter for the Judases of Tammany," Spinola then 
charged Samuel J. Tilden and his friends with selling 
out Hancock. " We may not have an office under the 
City government," he said, in conclusion, " but they cannot 
destroy Tammany Hall. It had its birth with the Repub- 
lic, and it will never die until it is laid side by side in the 
same coffin with the Republic." 

Mr. Kelly then stepped forward from the chair and 
said: 

" I suppose, gentlemen, that most of the members expect that I 
should say a few words before the adjournment of this meeting. It is 
proper that I should. It has been said that Mr. Kelly has been deprived 
of the office he held as Comptroller. He can live without it ! If thero 
is any man who thinks it is a matter of much consequence, I would 
assure him that it is not. "While I held the position I discharged my 
duties faithfully to the city, and to the Democratic party which placed 
me there, and my record in that office is proof of the fact. Mayor 
Cooper admitted, before the Senate Investigating Committee, that he 
had been elected by the Kepublicans and a faction of the Democ- 
racy, and felt that he should give representatives of those factions posi- 
tions. What an humble, what a degraded position for a man to confess 
himself in ! Physiognomists say that Ihe shape of the head and face de- 
termines the character of the man. If that be so, let any man look at 
Cooper's face, and he will see what he is. I believe with the old Sena- 




(Ufilrawii Irom Hni|)ci's Weekly. By pcTiiils.ilDn. Copyifelit, is;7, l)y Harper & Hriitliers.) 



John Kelly, 



WAR DANCE BY THE BOSS. O'Jlt 

tor, who refused t> vote for a General who parti'd his hair in the 
middle. Mc Cooper has not common honesty ; he has surrounded 
himself with some of the worst scoundrels in the City, and has ap- 
pointed men to office who were unfit to fill any place and are a disgrace 
to humanity. In the Board of Aldermen we had four traitors who 
belonged t) Tammany Ilall. A look at those men will show their 
characters." 

But Kelly ought to have looked at them before lie 
nominated them. Kelly then mimicked the raauiicr of 
walking and talkinsj of the four Tammany Aldermen 
who had voted for the Mayor's nominees. The mimicry 
provoked hearty laughter. He proceeded : 

" One of them waddled around like a duck in this manner" (walking 
around the platform in a swaggering, rowdyish way), " and like a duck 
has his head always down, ready to pick up anything out of the gutter. 
Another of them has the manner of a loafer, and talks in this style : 
' Well, youse thought I didn't amount to anything, but I do. I'm a 
member of the Kommon Kouncil (with two k's) and these fellows 
came to see me because I had a vote in the Kommon Kouncil, and I 
know what my vote is worth ! ' These two men," continued ilr. 
Kelly, " say they represent the Irish race. But God forbid that they 
should represent any respectable old race, and they do not. Then 
there are two elegant fellows who claim to represent the German race. 
One of these is a barber, and shaves people, and the other is a brewer, 
and makes beer. Are the.se the class of men who should represent you 
in the Common Council? Like the old Goth who had plundered 
liome, these men should be buried in the bottom of the river— tbe 
Bronx, if you wish— and the purchase money for which they sold 
themselves buried with them. Let not the place of their dishonorable 
burial be known to mortal man, but let the fact be recorded that four 
men received money for their votes, and were then taken to a river and 
buried with their plunder. Tammany Hall had used every honorable 
influence to keep these men true to their party and themselves, but 
they had said, ' The influence that now controls me is here (tapping 
his trousers-pocket), and you can all go to the devil.' " 

After a passing allusion to Mayor-elect Grace, whom 
Kelly complimented, he referred to the alleged bargain 
between Mayor Cooper and the Republican leaders, and 
said : 



630 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

"When a Unitecl States Senator leaves "Washington and comes to 
this City to go into secret conclave with Ward politicians, to make 
dishonorable combinations, as Senator Conkling has done, the public 
may rest assured that that man will use corrupt means in the National 
Legislature to work out his purposes, irrespective of the interest of the 
people. It was a disgraceful scene, to see a United States Senator 
descend from his high position to enter into bargains and deals with 
low, cunning, and dishonest Ward politicians." 

Mr. Kellj concluded his remarks hj saying: 

" And now, gentlemen, were I to consult my own convenience and 
pleasure, I would be out of politics. I have no ambition to be looked 
up to as a leader. I am one of yourselves, and if I am a leader, it was 
because you allowed me to get first and made me one. You can stop 
this at any moment ; this moment, if you so desire. Nine years ago, 
I found Tammany Hall in wretchedness and filth, and every room 
emitting a stench. I and those acting with me were called upon to 
re-organize the party. We did so, and were victorious. We have now 
been beaten; but if we have, we fought for principle. The press and 
people to-day may think a great victory has been achieved in depriving 
me of office ; but there may be a revulsion of feeling. Men who had 
claimed to be Democrats had worked in dark and devious ways, by 
stealth and in secrecy, and these were the men who betrayed the 
National Democracy and defeated its candidates. The record of Tam- 
many Hall in the late election was bright and clear as an electric light. 
Would to God that men not in Tammany Hall had been as faithful to 
General Hancock. Then we would have a different story to tell ; for 
General Hancock would have been President-elect. (Cheers.) The 
papers say I am down, but I care not. I love retirement and quiet ; 
but, as you have expressed your confidence in me as a leader, you can 
at all times, under all circumstances, in light or dark, command my 
services." (Prolonged cheers.) 

Kesolutions were then adopted, denouncing Aldermen 
Haffen, Helbig, Goodwin and Foster, the four Aldermen 
referred to by Kelly ; asking for the appointment of a sub- 
committee to investigate charges against them of having 
accepted bribes ; and recommending that they be publicly 
expelled from the General Committee at the next meeting. 

But, notwithstanding Kelly's evident satisfaction with 
the condition of things in Tammany Hall, the work of 
disintegration had already begun, resignations of members 



DISINTEGRATION OF TAMMANY. 6:n 

in lar<T^e numbers were being received, and steps for tlie 
formation of a new and vigorous Democratic organization 
bad already been taken, of wbicb I sball have something 
to say in another letter. 



LETTER L. 

Intrigue Which Led to the Nomination of a Mayor — 
Coalition Between Victorious Irving Hall and Much- 
Subdued Tammany — Memorable Deal at Westminster 
Hotel — A Hat as a Substitute F( r a Nominating Con- 
vention — How the Boss Outflanked the Irving Hall 
" Statesmen " — Popular Disapprobation op Political 
Huckstering — Narrow Escape from Defeat of United 
Democracy Nominees — An Indication of What Inde- 
pendent Democrats Can Do in a Municipal Contest. 

My dear Dean : 

In the preceding letter I alluded to the Mayoralty eon 
test of 1880,. but I did not speak of certain peculiar ante- 
cedents of that bitter canvass, which may serve to illustrate 
another feature of Bossisra in local politics not previously 
referred to. 

Inasmuch as John Kelly, the then "'Prodigal Son" 
of Democracy, and John R. Fellows, the representative 
of the then victorious Irving Hall faction, after the public 
reconciliation in which they took part at the National Con- 
vention of 1880, had made such glowing promises of what 
New York would do for General Hancock, as the Presiden- 
tial nominee, the leaders of the rival organizations felt that 
it was incumbent upon them to make a show of " getting 
together" and presenting a united front to the opposi- 
tion. As a rule, the selfish desire of local political leaders 
to control the vast patronage of a great City like New^ 
York has. always predominated, and has been of much 
greater interest to them than success of a Presidential can- 
didate. This was the condition of affairs at the time of 
which I speak. 

683 



PACIFIC OVERTURES OF TWO R09SE8. rt3:< 

Edward Cooper, son of the imicli rovored philanthropist, 
Peter Co,)per, was ]\[;iyor. lie had at liis command nonii- 
nitions for several lucrative olHce.^^ s.)i)n to become vacant, 
in('ludin<2^ that of Comptroller, held by Kelly, and also 
Commissioner of the Department of Public Works— a posi- 
tion of great power. Cooper, who had been two years 
previously elected as an Irving Hall Democrat, with a lle- 
publicau endorsement, was not only willing but anxious to 
be renominated, a? his term was about to expire also. Thus 
there were what poker-players would call '' three of a kind ; " 
for, besides the Mayor, Kelly and Thompson were on 
the anxious seat— the former wanting to be re-appointed 
Comptroller and the latter very desirous of filling the 
Commissionership of the Department of Public AVorks 
as compensation for his " patriotic " endeavors. Mayor 
Cooper held the key of the situation. Had he been willing 
to reappoint Kelly as Comptroller, everything would 
have been harmonious in the camps of the leaders ; for 
Cooper would have been re-elected Mayor, Kelly would 
have been gratified in the realization of his desires, and 
so would Thompson ; but Cooper had been so out- 
spoken against the re-appointment of Kelly that he felt 
he could not recede ; and hence, there was a mutual decla- 
ration of war so far as the Mayor and Kelly were con- 
cerned, but still both were disposed to keep on the alert for 
chances. 

At a Presidential election it is impracticable for either 
the Tammany or anti-Tammany factions to make a combi- 
nation with their Republican opponents ; and as the only 
hope for the leaders of the Democratic factions, Kelly and 
Thompson, to carry their point was to dwell together in 
unity, overtures to that end were made at the beginning of 
September ; Boss Kelly, in the meantime, bending all his 
energies to keep the members of the Board of Aldermen 
so divided that Mayor Cooper would be checkmated in any 



834 THIRTY YEARS O^ NEW YORK POLITICS. 

effort on his part, should he attempt to fill the approaching 
vacancies with nominees not suited to Kelly's mind. 

In accordance with a previous understanding, the two 
wings of the Democracy met on neutral ground, at West- 
minster Hotel, (within a stone's throw of the rival Halls,) 
on the second day of September. Irving Hall was repre- 
sented by Hubert O. Thompson, John McKeon, Emanuel 
B. Hart, Timothy Shea, Peter Bowe, Wm. A. Butler, 
Michael Norton, Wm. P, Mitchell, Maurice J. Power, 
Thomas Costigan and James J. Mooney ; the Tammany 
wing was represented by John Kelly, Wm. R. Hoberts, 
Henry D. Purroy, Samuel Conover, Edward D. Gale, Fran- 
cis B. Spinola, R. B. Martine, Wm. Yan Wyck, Henry 
Woltman, John W. Browning and Peter Gillespie, 

After shaking hands and indulging in the complimen- 
tary remarks common to rivals who meet for harmony, but 
with the intention of getting the better of each other, 
if possible, Kelly courteously suggested that Thompson 
be made chairman of the joint conference, and after the 
Irving Hall leader had taken the chair, Kelly added 
that he was very glad to see the spirit in which the Com- 
mittee had come together. " Tammany is willing," he 
said, " to sacrifice anything and everything to secure the 
success of the Democratic cause, and she assumes that the 
other side is also as willing." This was as plain an intima- 
tion as the Boss could throw out to Mayor Cooper that 
there was a possibility of making comfortable conditions. 
If Mayor Cooper had only been willing to " sacrifice " his 
determination not to appoint Kelly Compti'oller, the Boss 
would have " sacrificed " his hostility to that gentleman, 
and all differences might have been settled then and there ; 
but, as the poet Whittier says : 

" Of all sad words of tongue or pen 
The saddest are : It might have been. " 

There was no one jDresent authorized to speak for 



NOMINATIONS BY LotTKltV. ('.35 

Cooper on the main point ; and so the conference went on 
to a disgraceful conclnsion ; and notwithstanding Kelly 
played his c:irds with remarkable success all through the 
conferenco. Mayor Cooper got the better of him at last, as 
stated in the preceding letter. 

Emanuel B. Hart, after complimenting Kelly on his 
commendable desire for unity, said that Irving Hall was 
willing to meet him half-way, and although she now 
had the National stam]) of regularity, she would be gen- 
erous, and agree to an equal division of Congressmen and 
Assemblymen. Beyond this he was not authorized to go at 
that time. Kelly immediately said: "Well, I agree to 
that proposition," and then he suggested that each side 
select a sub-committee of four to make a division of the 
districts for each of their respective organizations. Messrs. 
Thompson, Bowe, Hart, and Butler were appointed on the 
part of Irving Hall, and Messrs. Kelly, Yan Wyck, Gale 
and Martine on the part of Tammany. After a long recess, 
the sub-committee returned without being able to agree 
upon a report, and then it was suggested that the matter of 
a division of nominees for Members of the Assembly be 
referred to the chances of a lottery. Twenty -four numbers 
were written on slips of paper, and placed in a hat, and the 
leaders, Messrs. Thompson and Kelly, drew from it alter- 
nately. The Eighteentli District (recognized as Kelly's, 
in which he resided) was one of the first drawn, and as 
Thompson produced the slip, indicating his prize, there 
was a general laugh, in which both Kelly and Thompson 
joined, heartily shaking hands with each other over 
the incident. As the drawing proceeded, there was 
apparent dissatisfaction on both sides ; for Tammany drew 
four anti-Tammany, four Republican and one Independent 
Republican district out of the twelve which that organiza- 
tion was by agreement entitled to — only three districts be- 
ing regular Tammany districts; and for Irving Hall, 



636 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK ROLITICS. 

Thompson drew seven Tammany districts, three Republi- 
can, one district in which the two organizations combined 
at the preceding election, and only one positively anti- 
Tammany district. As there was a general desire on the 
part of the committees to ascertain the extent of the dis- 
satisfaction that might prevail among the aspirants for 
nominations for Assembly, who had been " laying pipe " 
for months past, but who, owing to the awkwardness of the 
drawing that had taken place, would now find " their noses 
out of joint," a recess was taken before proceeding any 
further with the lottery. The next day the Conference 
Committee took up the matter of a division of the Con- 
gressional districts. After a long talk, both sides agreed 
upon a give-and-take settlement of the Fifth, Sixth, Ninth 
and Tenth districts, but they could not agree upon a division 
of the Seventh, Eighth and Eleventh districts ; and so the 
lottery was again brought into play. On the suggestion 
of Gen. Spinola it was decided that ten slips of paper 
should be put into a hat, eight being blanks and two bear- 
ing the words " Seventh district " and " Eighth district," 
and that the party drawing the Eighth district should take 
the district in dispute, the Eleventh. John Kelly and 
Thompson then drew the slips alternately. After a few 
blanks, Thompson drew the slip marked " Eighth district," 
which, as it was a certain Republican district, did not excite 
in him much joy, but as it entitled him, according to 
agreement, to the Eleventh district, Thompson w^as satisfied. 
And then the rival Bosses again shook hands, and felt grand, 
and overpowering, and self-complacent. They had " done a 
big thing." 

But this lottery business — or using a hat as a sort of 
nominating convention — excited great disgust among the 
voters generally. It caused many Democrats to blush with 
shame to see their leaders got up in a public place, and 
coolly and even jocosely dispose of the votes of their re- 



IRVING HALL PUT8 UP A BLUFF. 637 

spective organizations, just as so many street hucksters 
might combine to dispose of a lot of s])oile(l fruit or market 
refuse. But the most sliauieful proceeding in tlie deal was 
not the mere ceremony of the division of the local spoils 
by lottery. It was the Bossy manner in which both 
Kelly and Thompson ran their respective henchmen. 
Kelly would "insist" upon this, and Thompson, in imi- 
tation, would " demand " that, as if all the districts and 
aspirants for office therein were their own private property. 

A decided hitch in the lottery business develoiJcd at 
about the third week in September. A final "drawing" 
was to have taken place on the 18th of that month, at the 
same hotel, and the Irving Hall managers were on hand ; 
but Kelly and his committee failed to appear. After a long 
wait, the Irving Hall people resolved " not to consent to an- 
other drawing for nominations unless it was agreed that 
Irving Hall should be allowed to name the Mayor." " If," 
said these resolutions, " Tammany is willing to concede that 
this, the first prize, shall be drawn by Thompson, then 
Irving Hall is willing that Kelly should take his choice 
of any one of the other prizes ; the remaining positions to 
be put in a hat, and Kelly and Thompson to be allowed 
to draw alternately." The offices or prizes, thus to be 
disposed by lottery were, among others, a Register, a 
Recorder and a Judge of the Superior Court. After reach- 
ing this conclusion, the Irving Hall portion of the Confer- 
ence Committee agreed to " send one more letter to 
Kelly," informing him of the time they would again be 
present to take part in the drawing, and it was determined 
that if Kelly did not come, then they would close the 
conference and " appeal to the people." 

After disposing of this business the Irving Hall delegates 
met in conference with the representatives of two German 
organizations, known as '" The German-American Inde- 
pendent Citizens Association" and "The German-American 



638 THIKTY YEARS OF NEW YORK I'uj.ITICS. 

Democratic Association." The joke of this device was 
that tliese two organizations were part and parcel of the 
Irving Hall organization ; and when it was found tljat 
Tammany Hall was unwilling to concede the Mayoralty to 
Irving Hall unless Mayor Cooper could agree to appoint 
Kelly Comptroller, and that the Mayor would not do that, 
it was decided to bring these German organizations into the 
lottery business as independent bodies, to assist Irving Hall 
to dominate Tammany. In pursuance of this plan the 
German representatives stated that " they had been in- 
structed to support the claims of Irving Hall to name the 
Mayor," and that they had been further instructed to state 
that " they would stand by Irving Hall, union or no union 
— in fact, they were really opposed to any union with Tam- 
many." 

Pausing for a moment at this point in my letter, my eye 
chanced to fall upon an item of news in a morning news- 
4)aper so apropos to the matter of which I have been writing, 
that I cannot resist the impulse of making a note of it : 

Reading, Penn., June 8th, 1897. 
"Several hundred persons to-day witnessed the ceremony of selecting 
a new Bishop of the Mennonite Church by lot, at Millersville, Lancaster 
County, Penn. It is a custom of the Mennonite sect to select their 
Bishop, as well as the ministers of the different congregations, by 
lottery, and it is a custom exclusive with this denomination. To-day 
there were four candidates for the office of Bishop. The Rev. Jacob 
Brubaker, of Mount Joy, took four Bibles, and into one placed a strip 
of paper containing the words, "Indicated as God's Choice." The 
Bibles were then shuffled together and one handed to each of the 
candidates. The Rev. Abraham Herr, of New Danville, Penn., re- 
ceived the Bible containing the slip, and was duly declared Bishop of 
the Mennonite Church. There was great rejoicing among his friends, 
and the fortunate minister received many congratulations. The Men- 
nonites are a very flourishing and industrious sect." 

If, in the world beyond the grave, John Kelly and 
Hubert O. Thompson should chance to meet Bishop 
Abraham Hen) the trio may have a pleasant laugh over 



TAMMANY "SCOOPS THE STAKES." m^^ 

tlie similarity of methods adopted in tlieir respective 
'' oro-aiiizatioiis " on this side of Jordan. 

The matter whicli caused the halt in the love-feast of 
the Tammany and anti-Tanimanyites was the pendint? 
State Convention, to be held at Saratoga on the 28th of 
September. Boss Kelly did not desire any more drawinj^s 
by lottery till he saw how he was going to be treated ; tlien, 
if allowed to come back into the party in good fellowship, 
so that he could return to New York in triumph, his friends 
said, he was willing to allow Irving Hall to name the 
Mayor, if he could be assured of liis re-appointment as 
Comptroller, ami of the appointment of Henry A.Gumble- 
ton as Commissioner of Public Works. But this modest 
proposition was i)ooh-poohed by the Irving Hall people, 
who did not see anything in it for Thompson. 

But, notwithstanding all Irving IlalTs assumptions and 
pretensions, its submission to Tammany Hall was complete. 
For Kelly managed to put off meeting in conference 
with them, under one pretext and another, until after the 
holding of the State Convention, and in spite of the avowed 
determination of the Irving Hall delegates to " appeal to 
the people" if Kell}'' did not meet with them, the 
Irving Hall Executive Committee in caucus passed resolu- 
tions tendering to Kelly one-half the delegates from 
this City to the State Convention. And to the surprise of 
every one, Mayor Cooper (who had dared to oppose the 
re appointment of Kelly as Comptroller, and for that 
reason, Kelly had declared, " should never be Mayor 
of New York again," just as he had said a year before 
that " Lucius Robinson should not again be Governor ") 
was present on a Tammany Hall reviewiug-stand, a few 
nights before the holding of the State Convention, wear- 
ing a Tammany Hall badge, having previously publicly an- 
nounced his withdrawal from the IMayoralty contest. 

The State Convention was held at the appointed tune. 



646 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and every tiling passed off smoothly, witlioiit a ripple of 
discord, the rival organizations of the metropolis having 
appeared with equal delegations, a strategical advantage 
having thus been gained by Tammany. 

The second of October had now been reached, and the 
settlement of a union on the County ticket was still on the 
tapis ; and the meetings of the Joint Conference Committee 
were again resumed at Westminster Hotel, when Kelly 
who, having been recognized at the State Convention, now 
assuming a dogmatic air, stated that he would renew the 
question he had previously asked, and which had remained 
unanswered, whether the representatives of Irving Hall 
still adhered to their determination to demand the right 
to name the candidate for Mayor. The delegates from 
Irving Hall asked leave to ^vithdraw for conference, and 
on returning answered Kelly's conundrum by stating that 
the Irving Hall delegation to the Conference Committee 
"had not been instructed to demand the Mayoralty nomi- 
nation," and that it was their desire and the desire of their 
organization to do everything they possibly could to come 
to some agreement with Tammany in the matter of uniting 
upon the County ticket. 

Everything was then going Kelly's way, for Irving 
Hall had abandoned all idea of " appealing to the people," 
as they had first resolved to do if Tammany would not 
agree to think as they thought ; Mayor Cooper had with- 
drawn from the Mayoralty field ; and they thought it was 
about time Kelly began making some of the " sacrifices " 
he had talked of at the commencement of the con- 
ference. 

But the BosR was then feeling in good fighting trim, and 
instead of " sacrificing," indulged in a long Tammany Hall 
speech, and wound up by saying that in his opinion 
"neither Tammany Hall nor Irving Hall should assume 
that to one or the other was bequeathed the incontestable 



XnjREATENED REVOLT IN IRVING HALL. G41 

right to nominate a Mayor for both organizations to sup- 
port." Then, as a last resort, a j)roj)osition was made by 
the Irving Hall delegates that both Tammany and Irving 
Hall should call separate Conventions in the districts 
allotted to them respectively, and nominate Congressmen 
and Asscmbly.men ; that the County Convention of each 
organization should be held on the same day and same 
hour, and a Conference Committee be appointed by each 
organization " instructed to bring about a union." Kelly 
promptly acquiesced in the suggested plan, and the time 
for the holding of the County Convention was then fixed 
for October 13 ; and the Joint Conference Committee 
adjourned to await the result. 

By this time dissensions and divisions in Irving Hall 
began to crop out, and those dissatisfied with developing 
Bossism openly denounced its leaders. One of these boldly 
expressed himself in this way : 

"There is a clique in our organization which desires to have the 
'inside track ' with any Mayor who may be agreed upon. These men 
want a man not versed in politics, because they believe they could run 
such a man's administration in their own interest. That is the whole 
secret of the trouble that has sprung up in these negotiations. There 
are others in Irving Hall who tvill never consent to the nomination of a 
3Iayor who will be under the influence of Maurice J. Power, Hubert 
O. Thompson and Thomas Costigan. Why, those men have the sub • 
limest impudence ! Who ever heard of them before they came into 
prominence under Cooper, in a little ring of their own ? By what 
right do they ' insist ' that they shall name a Mayor for a City like 
New York, with its wealth, its great commercial and financial interests, 
and its able, rich and influential Democrats? It is a perfect farce to 
even think of such a thing." 

The respective County Conventions were held on the 
13th of October, and Conference Committees were ap- 
pointed as agreed to. On the part of Tammany, the 
Committee consisted of P. G. Duffy, W. P. Kirk, J. J. 
Slevin, Thomas Shiels, H. A. Gumblcton, E. A. McCue, 
Wm. R. KobertSj E. O. Gale, J. J. Gorman, J. "W. Guntzer, 



64-2 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK rOJJTICS. 

Menzo Diefendorf, Henry Woltman, Sidney P. Nichols, 
John Keilly, Eichard J. Morrison, F. B. Spinola, Geo. W. 
Plunkett, John Kelly, Joseph J. McEvoy, Michael Tuomey, 
Francis Blessing, John McQuade, Charles Welde and Henry 
D. Purroy. 

The Committee from Irving Hall consisted of John 
Fox, Jeremiah Murphy, Daniel O'Reilly, Charles O'Pveilly, 
Michael Norton, James Bryan, George H. Purser, Bernard 
Kenny, Timothy Shea, Wm. P. Mitchell, H. N. Ford, Peter 
Bowe, John Clark, John Tyler Kelly, Thomas Costigan, 
Maurice J. Power, Henry Murray, Hubert O. Thompson, 
W. B. Finley, W. A. Butler, E. B. Hart, W. S. Andrews, 
Hugh Moore and J. J. Mooney. 

The Irving Hall portion of the " conference " had 
at a caucus selected a list of twelve names from which 
they thought a Mayor could be selected. This list was 
as follows: Wm. C. Whitney, Samuel D. Babcock, 
Franklin Edson, Emanuel B. Hart, Francis F. Marbury, 
Oswald Ottendorfer, John R. Voorhis, Andrew H. Green, 
John McKeon, Wheeler H. Peckham, Allan Campbell and 
Wm. R. Grace. The list of names thus selected was for- 
warded to their Tammany confreres, with the request that 
they make a selection on tlieir part of the names of twelve 
gentlemen whom they would prefer as Mayoralty can- 
didates. Their list was made up as follows: Augustus 
Scliell, August Belmont, J. Nelson Tappen, Arthur Leary, 
J. J. Gorman, John T. Agnew, Judge McQuade, S. S. 
Cox, O. B. Potter, Chas. Place, Chas. H. Haswell and 
Wm. B. Mackay. 

The Conference Committee met on the 19th inst. at Mon- 
ument House, Union Square. John Kelly in the mean- 
time having successfully " arranged " all matters to suit his 
ambitious purposes, Augustus Schell, like Mayor Cooper^ 
declined to be longer considered a candidate for the May- 
oralty, and ex- Alderman Purroy, in behalf of Tammany 



HOW MAYOK liKACE CAME TO THE FRONT. 043 

Hall, presented a response to the Irving llall proposition, 
as follows : 

" The point for which both organizations have most strenuously con- 
tended was the nomiuatiou for Mayor. The Tammany Committee has 
claimed for its organization the privilege of naming the candidate for 
]Vrayor, on the ground that it is the ancient, time-honored organization 
of the City Democracy ; that it is much larger and better known than 
its rival ; that it is the oldest, strongest and most influential Demo- 
cratic local organization in the county ; and that, as the Irving Hall or- 
ganization nominated the present Mayor of the City, the privilege of 
naming his successor this year fairly belongs to Tammany Hall. We 
do not complain that the representatives of Irving Hall strenuously 
insisted on the privilege of nominating the head of the City govern- 
ment, but we do feel that they have not given the reasons for conced- 
ing the nominations to Tammany the consideration and weight they 
deserve. 

"The Tammany Committee feels that further insistence upon a pre- 
rogative, which, though founded on right, is not of vital importance, 
would be injurious to the great and sacred interests we all have at 
heart. The time for conferences has ended ; the hour for action has 
arrived. We tlierefore accept your offer, in the spirit in which it was 
made, and with no purpose of reflecting upon the abilities, the merits, 
or the character of any of the gentlemen you have named, and have 
unanimously selected Wm. 11. (Jrace as the Democratic candidate for 
Mayor of the City of New York. " 

Maurice J. Power moved that the Irving Hall delegates 
heartily concur in the selection of the nominee made by 
Tammany Hall, which motion was unanimously adopted. 
It was then agreed that Tammany Hall should have the 
nominees for Register and Recorder, while Irving Uall 
would be entitled to the Judge of the Superior Court. 
Whereupon Tammany named Augustus T. Docharty for 
Register and Frederick Smyth for Recorder, and Irving 
Hall named Charles H. Truax for Superior Court Judge. 

In connection with the choice of Grace as one of 
Irving Hall's candidates for Mayor this incident was men- 
tioned. When the Irving Hall Conference Connnittee 
was meeting for the purpose of deciding upon a list of 
names to be sent to Tammanv Hall each member of the 



644 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Conference Committee who chose so to do proposed a 
name, and when the list was nearly completed Police 
Justice Murray moved that Wm. K. Grace be placed on the 
list. A motion was made, however, that the nominations 
be closed ; but ex-Senator Moore insisted that Grace be 
named as one of the Irving Hall candidates. This motion 
was at last acceded to, and the list of names was sent to 
Tammany JIall. 

TLe disgust of the rank and file of Irving Hall concern- 
inw the outcome of the Conference Committee was almost 
irrepressible. It was with the greatest difficulty that a 
rupture was prevented. It was plain to anyone that the 
would-be leader of the organization had been completely 
outwitted and out-generaled by John Kelly from the be- 
ginning of the conference, and now they found them- 
selves credited with a nominee for Mayor who had never 
been a member of their organization, and who was be- 
lieved to have been placed on the list of twelve names 
presented by Irving Hall through Tammany Hall intrigue, 
and that Grace had already promised Kelly a renomina- 
tion as Comptroller as the inducement for his selection. 

When the Tammany County Convention reassembled on 
October 19, Kelly ascended the platform and handed 
the Chairman, the late Henry L. Clinton, the report of 
the Conference Committee. There was an expression of 
evident satisfaction on Kelly's face which was unmis- 
takable. Every movement of his body indicated that he 
was "a winner." It was less than four months since 
Kelly was adjudged an " irregular," a deserter from the 
Democratic camp, in the Gubernatorial election of 18Y9, 
by a National Democratic Convention, and now he had 
almost reversed the position, and carried oif all the spoils 
through his adroit management of the several confer- 
ences. He felt so good he had to talk, and this is what 
he said : 



rol'l'LAR DISr.UST AT LOTTERY CANDIDATES. «45 

" Tlie several conferences which have been behl by Tammany Hall 
^vitli Irving Ilall have re-iulted in agreeing on nominees for most of the 
ollices to be filled. It has been nn'ortunate that tlie Democratic jiarty 
in the greatest City in the Union has heretofore been divided. It has 
given power to the minority which they could not otherwise have 
obtained. Thc-^e divisions have alwaj's resulted in a partial demorali- 
zation of our City government. The power has been thus so divided 
that no party lias felt responsible for what has been done tending to 
injure the welfare of the people. Let us all congratulate ourselves that 
now there is a imited party in the City. That party is to be led by 
one flag, and on it is written that the Democracy of the City and 
County of New York is consolidated under that leader who led the 
soldiers of the country to victory." 

The Irving Hall County Convention also ratified the 
agreement of the Conference Committee, viz., Wm, R. 
Grace for Mayor, Angustus Docharty for Register ; Fred- 
erick Smyth for Recorder, and Charles H. Truax for Su- 
perior Court Judge ; but a most violent opposition to both 
Grace and Truax sprang up. A sectarian issue was 
brought into the canvass, because Grace was a Catholic, 
as was shown in the preceding letter, and it was also 
claimed that he was not a naturalized citizen ; while bitter 
scandals were uttered against Truax, and he was strongly 
opposed by the Bar Association. 

The returns of the election on the County ticket evi- 
denced the disgust of the rank and file of the Democracy 
at the selfishness of the leaders in their contest for the 
spoils of office rather than the success of the Presidential 
ticket. Six weeks of hide-and-go-seek ])erformances at 
conference matinees— in the interest of Kelly on one 
side and Hubert O. Thompson on the other — left only a 
two weeks' campaign (from October 20 to November 
IVfor Hancock. This made the Democracy mad; and, 
while Gen. Hancock received 41,376 majority in this City, 
"Wm. R. Grace, for Mayor, received only 2,914 majority, 
and Chas. H. Truax, for Superior Court Judge, 2,918 
majority. Had it not been a Presidential year popular dis- 



646 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

gust at the two Bosses and their political lottery would 
have recorded a majority against their nominees of at 
least 25,000 ; for there are enough independent Democrats 
in the metropolis to bury Bosses and Bossism out of sight 
at any time. 



LETTER LI. 

Crisis in the Career of a Rkpublk;an Boss — Rosooe Conk- 
LiNcj's Jealousy of James G. Blaine and His Fight 
Against President Garfield — Unexampled Quarrel 
Over Political Patronage— Conkling's Manceuvres to 
Boss an Administration — The President's Determination 
to " Sit Down Upon" a Would-be Dictator — Conkling's 
Appeal for Vindication a Dismal Failure — Assassina- 
tion OF President Garfield — Culmination of Violent 
Political Excitement — Vice-President Arthur Takes 
the Oath as Garfield's Successor. 

My dear Dean : 

Of all Bosses who during the last thirty years have 
held a place in the public mind, and who fancied that, if 
they did not own, they at least hel'd a heavy mortgage on 
the people of this City and State, Roscoe Conkling, a bold 
and dashing politician of the Radical school, was, perhaps, 
the most positive and domineering, as he was the most 
magnetic. Conkling, who was related by marriage to 
Horatio Seymour (an ex-Governor of this State, and an 
eminent Democrat, to whom I have before alluded), repre- 
sented for many years with distinguished ability the Utica 
Congressional District of this State, in the Federal House 
of Representatives, until advanced to a seat in the United 
States Senate, soon after which he assumed the leadership 
on the Republican or Radical side, and developed into a 
Boss of the first magnitude. He did not, as a leader, 
possess the practical ability of either Wm. M. Tweed or 
John Kelly ; but, arrogant and imperious as the last-named 
gentleman had become in the latter part of his career, in 
the role of dictator he was eclipsed by Roscoe Conkling, 

647 



648 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

After James A. Garfield's inauguration as President, 
March 4, 1881, lie selected as members of liis Cabinet two 
of the gentlemen who had been proposed as candidates for 
the Presidential nomination in the Convention of 1880, and 
whose retirement as candidates, after the thirty-sixth ballot, 
brought about his nomination and election as Chief Execu- 
tive. One of tiiese, James G. Blaine, he made Secretary 
of State; the "other, William Windom, was chosen Secretary 
of the Treasury. Blaine had long been a very active mem- 
ber of the House of Representatives, and was, when called 
to the Cabinet, a United States Senator. He was one of 
the brainiest men in the Republican party, and would have 
been its leader had not Coulding monopolized that position 
during President Grant's Administration. But now that 
Blaine had been made head of the Cabinet, after having 
rendered a service which the President highly appreciated, 
it was quite natural for one in his position to ask for the 
recognition of certain friends who had been ardent in ad- 
vancing his political aspirations. On March 21, 1881, in 
appreciation of the friendly service of Senator Conkling, 
the President had nominated two of his "Stalwart" 
adherents for New York Federal offices. Gen. Stew- 
art L. Woodford, for IT. S. Attorney for the Southern 
District of New York, and Louis F. Payn for U. S. Marshal. 
A few davs afterward he also nominated, at the request of 
Senator Sherman, Edwin A. Merritt for Consul-General at 
London, and Albert Badeau for Charge d' Affaires at Den- 
mark ; and then, at the solicitation of Secretary Blaine, he 
nominated for tiie office of Collector of the Port of New 
York ex- Judge Wm. H. Robertson, then President fro tevi. 
of the New York State Senate. The nomination of Robert- 
son was a complete surprise to Conkling. Robertson 
was not a " Stalwart" (that is, an advocate of a third Presi- 
dential term for Gen. Grant) ; on the contrary, in the 
National Convention he was one of eighteen New York 



SENATOR CONKLING AS A BOSS. 649 

delegates who (ipenly expressed a preference for Blaiiio 
as a Presidential candidate, and therefore ]ij was not one 
of Conkling's favorites. But those who were disposed 
to reii:ard kindly whatever President Garfield might do 
were ready with explanations designed to show the fairness 
of a middle course in bestowing turn-about favors upon 
" Stalwarts" and '* Independents " of the Republican party; 
M'liile others, who recalled the fact that Garfield's nomina- 
tion was due to anti-" Stalwart " support, said he meant to 
give offices to ''Stalwarts" solely from motives of ])olicy, 
and to '"■ Independents " fn)m actual preference ; and that 
naturally, therefore, the most important places would fall 
to the latter. The nominations previously made led every 
one to believe that Conkling was to be consulted on matters 
pertaining to ISTew York patronage; the nomination of 
Robertson seemed to indicate that Blaine desired to control 
the most valuable and important part of that patronage, 
and that the President was disposed to aid him in so doing. 
When the nomination of Robertson was sent in by the 
President, the President of the Senate ("Vice-President 
Arthur) sent it over to Conkling, who at once consulted his 
associate Senator from New York, Thomas C. Piatt. Then 
Conkling put on a haughty sneer that plainly indi- 
cated mischief ; for Conkling was chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Commerce and Navigation, to which such a 
nomination as that of Robertson would be referred, and it 
might therefore be taken for granted that any report on the 
Robertson nomination would await his (Conkling's) pleasure. 
By the country at large this action on the part of the Presi- 
dent was regarded as a '' Blaine triumph "; it seemed to 
prove that he had taken charge of the Administration and 
was ready to take a stand against Conkling. The senior 
Senator from New Yoi-k was surprised at such audacity, 
because his authority as Repuldiean Boss of New York 
affairs had never before been disrespected, and he had sup- 



650 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

posed that tlie acceptance of the portfolio of Secretary of 
State meant Blaine's retirement from active politics for 
four years ; whereas now the Cabinet chief was grasping 
one of the most important appointments for partisan pur- 
poses within the gift of the President This move Conk- 
line; determined to resist. 

By formal resolution, the next day, the New York Legis- 
lature endorsed the President's nomination of Kobertson 
for Collector of the Port of IS'ew York, and sent it by 
telegraph to Conkliug, who seemed at first astonished, 
but afterward laughed, as if it were a piece of rare humor 
designed for his especial enjoyment. "When he had finished 
looking at the telegram, he slowly folded it, wrote a brief 
note, and sent the two to presiding officer Arthur who, in 
turn, smiled at the telegram and chuckled over the note. 
The telegram being returned to Conkling, he showed it to 
Senator Piatt, who, as a new member of the Senate (having 
taken his seat in the month of January, 1881,) was regarded 
as a modest and unobtrusive adherent of Conkling, his 
senior associate. But when Conkling began to realize that a 
majority of the newly-elected Republican Senators were 
friends of Blaine, he became not a little uneasy lest that 
gentleman might induce them, by a majority vote in a 
caucus, to relieve Conkling's Committee on Commerce and 
Navigation of further consideration of the Robertson 
nomination, and thus get it into Executive session for 
action by the Senate. What made him feel still more 
troubled was the fact that Secretary Blaine had already 
secured the appointment of a friend, in the person of "Wm. 
E. Chandler, as Solicitor-General of the United States, — 
an official who had supervision of all the various bureaus 
of customs and claims, and could overhaul the Federal 
Courts, the offices of all United States District Attorneys 
and Marshals, and investigate all suits involving National 
Banks, So if Blaine should succeed in getting the Robert- 



" BULLDOZING " A PRESIDENT. C,r>l 

son nomination conlirnicd, Cunkling's position as Boss would 
be precarious indeed. 

Conkling then made up his mind that he had serious 
work to do, and his first step was to work on the President 
through Senator Allison, for whom Garfield had very high 
respect, and endeavor to secure a recall of the nomination 
of Kobertson, on the ground that his confirmation would 
split the Republican party in the State of New York 
instead of helping it, and its influence would consequently 
he damaging. But Conkling did not make any headway in 
that direction. In the meantime, Blaine began to work 
his wires, and the idea gradually dawned upon Senators 
that it was not a proper thing for the Chairman of a Com- 
mittee to " pocket " a nomination, with the determined 
purpose of having no action taken on it. As the President 
felt assured that a majority of the new Senators would 
stand by him' in his recognition of Blaine, and believing 
also that nearly if not quite one-half of the old Republican 
Senators were similarly disposed, he set on foot a plan to 
more firmly secure the co-operation of Democratic Sena- 
tors, by promises of the confirmation of persons to oflice 
throughout the South whom they desired. President Gar- 
field no doubt realized that such a course of action would 
alienate Conkling, but, as it was apparent to him that that 
gentleman would not be friendly unless he could have 
everything his own way, the President had decided to '' let 
the break come." 

Senator Conkling then tried to outflank the President. 
He started into bargainings with the Southern Senators, 
telling them it was at the instigation of the most objection- 
able of the Southern '' carpet-baggers " so-called, that Wm. 
E. Chandler had been appointed Solicitor-General of the 
United States, and as such would have the supervision and 
control of the judicial machinery of the Union ; that 
Chandler would be especially charged with the execution 



652 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of the Enforcement, Election and other laws theretofore 
invoked in aid of the prosecution and persecution of citi- 
zens of the United States for alleged political offences ; in 
fact, to use his own words, he avowed that " The appoint- 
ment of Chandler was simply a proposition to organize hell 
in the Southern States, and to reopen sectional excitement 
in its worst form." The JSTew York trio — Conkling, Piatt 
and Arthur — hoped to get Robertson rejected by first 
voting to reject Chandler ; claiming that it was a matter of 
very little concern who sat at the Customs desk in New York 
and received the revenue, but that it was a matter of grave 
public interest that a " desperate partisan like Chandler, a 
fanatical tool of sectional agitators, should be prevented 
from having such sweeping opportunities as the position in 
question would afford him to gratify his thirst for the per- 
secution of the Southern people." Conkling was very in- 
dustrious in presenting these views to Southern Senators, 
and even offered to secure for them one or two Chairman- 
ships of Committees through presiding officer Arthur, if 
he could be assured of their co-operation in his efforts to 
defeat such unwise nominations as Chandler and Robertson. 
At this crisis, the New York World thought it proper to 
sound a note of alarm to Southern Senators, which it did in 
its editorial columns, on April 1, 1881, in these words : 

"'If any Democratic Senator is thinking only of New York politics, 
and of the mere party relations of the pending question of Presidential 
nominations, the Democrats of New York must frankly tell him that 
nothing but injury to the Democracy of New York has come or can 
come of coalitions with Senator Conkling. The past is eloquent on 
this subject. Such coalitions are necessarily demoralizing and degrad- 
ing to all parties t o them. Such conditions can have no other basis 
than the spoils of office. Whether set on foot by Mr. Tilden, in 1873, 
or by Mr. Kelly, at a later date, Democratic coalitions with Mr. Conk- 
ling have benefited only the Republicans. Mr. Tilden finally came to 
grief through them, and so did Mr. Kelly; and what is more important, 
so did the Democratic party. The reorganized Democracy of New 
york City warns Democratic Senators, in Washington, to mike no 



|u^^ 



L 
UNPRECEDENTKl) FKIIIT KoU Sl'olLS. (ir,!? 



coalition with President Carticld, or Secretary lilaiiie, or Scimtor 
Hobcrlson.^j The Kepublicnn leaders defeated (jcncral Ilaiicock by tiic 
use of money aud partly by immoral eoulilious -with unworthy Demo- 
crats, iu which Senator (Conkiiug and Vice-President Artiiur were the 
chief Republican conspirators. It is high time that the false lights 
which Senator Coukling displayed to certain Democratic Senators, and 
with the help of which the nominations of President Hayes were 
thwarted, should be understood, now that a fraudulent President is no 
longer in ollice. The chequered career of Senator Conkliug should 
compel cautious people to inquire careful!}' into the evidence for any 
declaration which may be made by him as to President Garfield and 
his undertaking." 

It may be proper to state, in explanation of this con- 
troversy hetween Conkling and the President, that the 
Federal Constitution puts the responsibility for nomina- 
tions made to the Senate on only one man, the President, 
and holds him and only him responsible for the character 
aud qnalilications of the nominees. But Conkling desired 
an interpretation of the Constitution which would require 
that the President should first confer with Senator Conkling 
and Senator Piatt, and, having received their consent to 
the nomination of any particular person for office in the 
State of New York, the President then " shall " nominate 
the person to whose nomination such Senators shall have so 
consented. A State cannot, as a State, interfere with and 
dictate tlie decision of the President in a matter which the 
Constitution has confided to his discretion. The State of 
New York can, through its Senators, vote to reject a nomi- 
nation ; but there the power of the State ends. Conkling's 
idea was that he carried the State of New York in his 
pocket, and that he was " a bigger man than Gen. Gar- 
field " — in other words, that every Senator, he especially, 
was, in the affairs of his own State, the President's 
Boss. And realizing the fact that, as matters had now 
shaped themselves, the existence of the Republican ma- 
cliinery of New York State, as represented by Senator 
Conkling and Vice-President Ai-thur, was involved in the 



654 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

defeat of Robertson as Collector of the Port, and finding 
that diplomacy had no effect, they determined to op- 
pose that confirmation with all the powers at their com- 
mand. So bitter was the fight on the part of Conkling 
that he threatened to open a campaign of personal defama- 
tion against Gen. Garfield, and Radical organs of " Stal- 
wart" tendencies began to denounce the President's act in 
nominating Robertson for Collector, as " a great crime." 

In his " rule or ruin " fight Conkling went so far that he 
endeavored to involve in it the local affairs of the City of 
New York. A Citizens' Committee had been appointed to 
ask the State Legislature, in order to secure a better condi- 
tion of the public streets, that a bill should be passed con- 
ferring upon the Mayor of New York City all the power 
necessary for a consummation so much desired. The State 
Senate had promply passed the Bill, and Senator Robertson 
had taken an active part in its favor. Conkling then sent 
word to his " Stalwart " followers in the Assembly to resist 
this Senate Bill, hoping thereby to so hamper the demands 
of the metropolis for protection against disease and death 
from filthy streets, that its Republican representatives, worn 
out and weary from the opposition thus created, would, 
to secure his co-operation, join in his demand for the re- 
jection at Washington of Senator Robertson's nomination 
as Collector. 

On April 13 an attempt was made to get the Legislature 
to " take the back track " on its action approving of the 
appointment of Senator Robertson as Collector. A paper 
was prepared for the signature of members, addressed to 
the United States Senate, and reading as follows : 

"We the undersigned Republican Members of the Legislature, 
believe the Members of the United States Senate are competent to act 
and decide upon such nominations as may be sent them for offices in 
this State by the President, without any regard to the resolutions 
purporting to have been adopted, or any instructions, by this Legisla- 
ture." 



GAKFIKLI) ASTOUNDS BOSS CONKLING. 658 

The cunningly devised object of this move was to pro- 
vide Senator Conkling with something to show that tlie 
Republicans in tlie Now York Legislature did not consider 
the resolution previously adopted of any account, or worth 
noticing. But this retrograde movement was not much 
relished even by Conkling's warmest supporters, and it was 
not a success. 

As the situation of affairs had " dead-locked " the United 
States Senate, at a caucus of Republican Senators a com- 
mittee was appointed to ascertain if it were not possible to 
bring about a better condition of things. This committee 
waited upon the President, told him that Conkling had 
given them to understand that his constituents earnestly 
desired the withdrawal of Robertson's nomination, a com- 
pliance with which desire, they believed, would break the 
existing ''dead-lock;" and asked him if it would be em- 
barrassing to him to withdraw Robertson's nomination, so 
as to have all the other nominations, long " hanging fire," 
confirmed. The President replied, with emphasis, that 
" No such proposition could be entertained ; " and the com- 
mittee respectfully withdrew. When Conkling was ad- 
vised of the President's determination to have the Senate 
take action upon tlie nominations, either by confirmation or 
rejection, and that there was to be no change of base on 
Garfield's part, as up to this time the Senator had confi- 
dently expected, Conkling informed his friends that war 
had now begun in earnest ; and that he intended to prove 
the President '*' a colossal liar," in having lied to himself 
and to Arthur and to Piatt, in New York City and else- 
where. 

A political crisis had now been reached. Realizing, from 
all he could learn, ^hat Conkling was determined to fight 
him to the bitter end, the President made uj) his mind to 
sit heavily down on the Senator, and on May 5 he sent a 
communication to the Senate, withdrawing from that body 



656 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the nominations of all of Conkling's friends, liitlierto sent 
in, and standing firmly by the nomination of Robertson. 
A reporter tlins describes the scene in the Senate chamber : 

Mr. Conkling was reading a letter when the President's clerk arrived 
with the Executive communication. Mr. Arthur, the presiding officer, 
opened it, and after the usual signals had passed between him and Mr. 
Conkling, the latter became more attentive to his letter, and when Mr. 
Arthur passed the communication forward to the Reading Clerk, and it 
was read by him, the color left Mr. Conkling s cheek, but he held onto 
his letter, and did not look up. Senator Piatt hung his head. Senator 
Logan shut his jaws tight, and looked straight ahead at nothing. Sen- 
ator Hoar smiled, and, being caught at it, blushed and grew watery in 
the eyes ; and Vice-President Arthur tore an envelope to pieces on his 
lap. Not a sound was made by anyone, and the communication took 
the usual course. 

The an ti-" Stalwart" Senators were in high glee over 
this action of the President. He could not, they said, re- 
tain party respect for his Administration, after taking so 
firm a stand, by adopting any other course. His answer 
to presumptuous dictation commanded their admiration ; 
and the presenting of a resolution taking Robertson's nom- 
ination away from Conkling's committee was again dis- 
cussed by Senators, while Conkling gave out that "the Ad- 
ministration had plunged itself into a hopeless war, in 
wbich Garfield's second term aspirations would be cut off." 
The Senator's sulkiness was augmented by the announce- 
ment that a Democratic Senator had received a letter from 
Horatio Seymour (Conkling's brother-in-law, as I have be- 
fore stated) urging in strong terms the confirmation of 
Robertson's nomination. 

Republican Senators then began to assure the President 
of their support, and Conkling, who, it now leaked out, 
had arranged a combination to confirm all nominations, 
save that of Robertson, on the very day the President 
check-mated him, began to make new overtures for personal 
aid to Democratic Senators. The President, in the mean- 
time, having boldly thrown down the gage of war, let it be 




( Redrawn from Harper's Weekly. By i)ern)isslon. Copyright, 18%, by Uarper & Brothers.) 

Thomas C. Platt. 



ROSCOE PLAYS HIS LAST TRUMP. eSt 

understood tliat, " while he expected to give and take only 
fair treatment from Democrats, those Republicans who had 
banded against him could reach him thereafter only through 
letters of introduction." 

Now came Conkling's master stroke. Believing that he 
was beaten in his conflict with the President, he had one 
more card to play ; and as desperate diseases require des- 
perate remedies, he addressed to the presiding officer of the 
Senate, at the session held on the morning of May 16, this 
communication : 

Senate Chamber, WASHmoTON, D. C, ) 
May 16, 1881. f 

Sir : — Will you please announce to the Senate that my resignation, as 
Senator of the United States from the State of New York, has been 
forwarded to the Governor of the State. 
I have the honor to be, with great respect, Your obedient servant, 

RoSCOE CONKLING. 

To Hon. C. A. Arthur, Vice-President. 

At the conclusion of the reading of the foregoing com- 
munication a reporter says : " Senators looked about ; some 
smiled ; others scowled ; others twitched their mouths con- 
temptuously ; and others, chiefly Republicans, seemed 
utterly perplexed." The silence, however, remained un- 
broken, and Gen. Arthur handed over to the Reading Clerk 
another envelope, which contained the announcement of 
Senator Piatt's resignation in these words : 

Senate Chamber, May 16, 1881. 
To Hon. C. A. Arthxtr. 

Sir : — I have forwarded to tlie Governor of the State of New York 
my resignation as Senator of the United States for the State of New 
York. Will you please announce that fact to the Senate, 

With great respect, Your obedient servant, 

T. C. Platt. 

Silence followed the reading of this letter also, and the 
Senate held itself in readiness to lieu- perhaps the announce- 
ment of Gen. Arthur's resignation of the Vice-Presidency; 



658 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

but when it became evident that no sucb climax was forth- 
coming, there was great commotion on the floor. Senators 
wheeled their chairs together for comment and speculation. 
Few of them were excited, but all were manifestly inter- 
ested to the point of forgetting the requirements of order, 
and the buzzing and confusion lasted several minutes. 
Soon thereafter the Senate took a recess. 

The general interpretation of the resignations of Conkling 
and Piatt was that, when a Senator from the State of New 
York is no longer Boss, when he can no longer control the 
patronage of an Administration of his own party in his 
own State, he is of no further use as a Senator. Many of 
the friends of Conkling regarded his action as " a puerile 
piece of business." But the die was cast, and nothing now 
remained for Conkling and Piatt but an appeal to the New 
York State Legislature to change its mind, eat its own 
words, re-elect the indignant representatives, and thus give 
President Garfield a cut direct for presuming to run counter 
to Boss ConkVng, who remained in Washington after this 
" greatest effort of his life ; " but his associate Senator, 
Piatt, having discharged his shaft of defiance, took the first 
train to New York. 

The scene now shifts to Albany. The session of the 
State Senate, on the morning, of May 18, was duly opened 
with, prayer, but there was a noticeable restlessness on the 
part of members, who seemed to be on the tip-toe of expec- 
tation, and the proceedings were several times interrupted 
by Senators rushing out to the ante-room for telegraph 
dispatches. It seemed as if the entire Republican side of 
the Senate was in a state of fermentation. Just about half- 
past one o'clock, when the Senate was in Committee of the 
Whole on " a Bill to Facilitate tlie Extension of Bonds of 
Public Officials," a telegraph boy handed a message to 
Senator Robertson. Observing this, there was a scramble 
of Senators toward Robertson's seat, one of whom, Sena- 



VICTORY AND ASSASSINATION. 650 

tor AVoodin, taking the telegram from Senator Ilobcrt- 
son's liand, waved it in the air, which was accepted as a 
signal that the nomination of I^obertson as Collector of 
the Port of New York had been confirmed at Washing- 
ton ; and among the " Half-Breeds," (as the anti-" Stalwart " 
Ilepublicans were styled) this confirmation was regarded as 
"the last nail in the cofiin " of Boss Conkling, which in- 
deed it })roved to be. All further bnsincss in the Senate 
ceased for that day, an adjournment of the session was 
voted, and there was a general jubilee in which Senators 
and spectatoi-s took part. 

It is reported that President Garfield was writing at Iris 
desk when a dispatch from the Senate Chamber was handed 
him, announcing the confirmation of Robertson ; that he 
coolly glanced at it, and resumed his work, simply say- 
ing he "had expected no other outcome." In Albany 
there was a good deal of bluster on the part of Conkling's 
friends, mingled with threats of what he was going to do — 
" that he was going back to Washington to take the roof 
off the Administration Ring,' ' and many similar remarks. 
But he did nothing of the kind. 

Conkling, Piatt and Arthur joined in an earnest appeal 
to the Republicans of the State, claiming that their action 
regarding the nomination of Robertson was entirely in 
the interest of party harmony, and they felt that they 
deserved a vindication at the hands of their party. The 
party, however, took a different view of the matter ; for, 
after an eight weeks' bitter contest, commencing on May 31 
and extending to July 22, the balloting ended in the elec- 
tion of Warner ]\filler to fill the vacancy caused by the 
resignation of Piatt, and of Elbridge G. Lapham to fill 
the vacancy caused by the resignation of Conkling. Piatt 
gave up the fight on the first day of July, when Warner 
Miller was elected ; but Conkling hung on to the last day 
of the contest, when twenty- six of his legislative friends, 



660 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

realizing Conkling's utter defeat, absented themselves and 
did not participate in the last balloting. 

President Garfield did not long survive this contest witli 
Senator Conkling. When about setting out for a trip to 
New England, on the morning of July 2, 1881, he was shot 
by one Charles Guiteau, who claimed to be " a Stalwart 
of the Stalwarts." The President was passing through a 
waiting-room of the Baltimore and Potomac Pailroad depot, 
at about nine o'clock, in company with Secretary Blaine, 
when the assassin pulled the trigger of his pistol. The 
President lived, however, to see his would-be Boss defeated, 
for he lingered until September 19, when, after many painful 
and unsuccessful efforts to remove the assassin's bullet had 
been made, he departed this life — the victim of an insane 
fanatic. 

Upon the night of the day on which the President 
expired, Vice-President Arthur took the oath of office as 
President in this city, and straightway departed for Wash- 
ington. It was a critical time, a period of intense anxiety 
throughont the country, and no one had ever assumed the 
duties of that position amid such apprehensions, because of 
the prevalent exciting conditions. Perhaps I cannot give 
you a better idea of the situation at that time than by 
reproducing the remarks recently made by Elihu Root, 
of this city, on the occasion of the unveiling of a bronze 
statue recently erected in honor of President Arthur on the 
north-east corner of Madison Square. Mr. Root, spoke in 
part as follows : 

' ' No greater peril ever menaced the Constitutional Government of the 
United States than that which confronted the American people when 
President Garfield fell by the hand of Guiteau ou the 3d of July, 1881. 
External assaults consolidate a people and stimulate their loyalty to 
their institutions. But when Garfiekl fell the danger came from within. 
The factional strife within the dominant party, which resulted in the 
nomination of President Garfield, had been of unprecedented bitterness. 
Vice-President Arthur had been selected from the defeated faction. He 
was one of its most conspicuous and active leaders. 



"THE GREATEST EFFORT OF lllS LIFE." fWl 

" Stilled for a time during tlic ciinvass, tlic conlnwersy was resumed 
with renewed vigor and more violent feeling-; in the early days of the 
new Administration. It extended through every State and City and ham- 
let. Suddenly the adherents of the murdered President saw the powers 
1 of government about to be transferred to the leader of their defeated 
adversaries, and that transfer efifected by the act of an assassin. Many 
of them could not instantly accept the truth that it was the act solely 
of a half crazed and disappointed seeker for office ; many of them 
questioned whether the men who were to profit by the act were not the 
instigators of it. It seemed beyond endurance that Grarlield's enemies 
should profit by his death. 

'• Dark suspicions and angry threatenings filled the public mind, and 
for the moment there was doubt — grave doubt — and imminent peril thai 
the orderly succession of power under the Constitution might not take 
its peaceful course. Under such conditions, acting under the tele- 
graphed request of the Cabinet, in order that the first step might be 
safely passed, Arthur took the oath of office at his home, in Lexington 
avenue, in this City, at midnight on the night when Garfield died, and 
entered upon the solemn duties of the Presidency," 

Ou a preceding page I liave spoken of Conkling's 
resignation of his position as United States Senator as " the 
greatest effort of his life." It liad become the fashion 
among his admirers on the press to style every speech he 
made "the greatest effort of his life," and the phrase 
became a by-word and applied to his every act. Once, on 
Mr. Conkling's return from Europe, the Republican poli- 
ticians of the metropolis determined to give him a reception 
at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, and people generally looked 
forward with a good deal of interest to the speech he would 
deliver on the occasion. At that period the Republicans 
were split up into even more factions than the Democrats 
of this city usually are, and hated each other more in- 
tensely ; and of course it became a matter alike of public 
news and political importance to know just what particular 
faction Conkling would incline to, as that particular faction 
would then be regarded as " the Simon-pure " brand. So 
every Republican politician of any note in town gathered in 
and around the Fifth Avenue Hotel on the night in 



663 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

question. The reception was a large one, and Conkling 
talked abont European travel, and how this country com- 
pared with other countries, and how glad he was to breathe 
the air of New York again, and all that sort of thing. But 
he said nothing new, nothing worth quoting, nothing at all 
definite about anything or anybody. The speech was very 
disappointing. From any other man it would have fallen 
flat. People who were not politicians thought that " Our 
Own Roscoe " (as he was designated by his admirers) was 
failino-. But people who were politicians said to one another 
that Conkling had indeed made, on this occasion, " the 
greatest effort of his life "—the effort to say nothing at all 
about New York politics, not to commit himself to any 
one faction of the Republican party. It was the least 
eloquent, but perhaps the most effective, speech Roscoe 
Conkling ever made ; a speech the magic of which lay not 
in what was said, but in what was not said. 

Conkling never retrieved his status of Boss. Settling 
down to the practice of law in New York City, he, in 1888, 
met a fate almost as tragic as that of Garfield. Fighting a 
pathway through the snowdrifts of the '' Great Blizzard " 
of March of that year, the strain and exposure resulted in 
a cerebral abscess, from which he died. 



LETTER LII. 

Severe Comment on John Kelly's Early Career — Attempt 
OF Dissatisfied Democrats to Capture the Tammany 
Society— Those Who Figured as "Malcontents" — The 
Committee of One-Hundred Movement— Successful 
Formation of a New and Vigorous Democratic Organ- 
ization — Its Di^but at a State Convention — Tammany 
Delegates Again Out in the Cold — Triumph of the 
New York County Democracy. 

ISIy pear Dean: 

The " hot shot " poured into Boss Kelly after the de- 
feat of Hancock was not his first experience in that kind 
of warfare. In 1875, during the Mayoralty of Wm. H. 
Wickhani, Kelly, having surrounded himself with a coterie 
of satellites not generally liked, managed to estrange from 
the Tammany organization John Morrissey, Benjamin 
Wood, editor of the New York Daily News^ and a number 
of prominent men, who found refuge in the Irving Kail 
organization ; and a very bitter contest ensued that Fall, 
the Irving Hall and German Democratic organizations and 
the Republicans combining against Tammany Hall. The 
contest between John Morrissey and John Fox for Senator, 
in Tweed's old district (to which I have already referred), 
was a part of that very energetic fight. I now recur to it 
only to '^ive you a sample of the invective used against 
Kelly, at that time, by the ]S^ew York Times. I quote from 
the issue of that journal for October 20, 1875 : 

"About the same time, and in adjoining City districts, two Bosses 
entered upon public life. While Tweed, as a young man, was learning 
to make chairs in Cherry street, Kelly was being taught grate-settiug 
in Grand street. While Tweed was amusing himself as a runner with 
Big Six Fire Engine, Kelly was Captain of the Carroll Target Guard. 

663 



664 THIRTY" YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Tweed led fire-laddies of the Seventh Ward at Primaries, and Kelly 
dragged his target-shooters about the Sixth and Fourteenth Wards, 
upon the eve of elections, from Thomson's Hall, at the corner of Grand 
and Elizabeth streets, to the Bear Tavern in Bayard street. Tweed 
exercised his faculties in the arts which afterwards led to the founda- 
tion of the Americus and Blossom Clubs, while Kelly engaged in 
muscular exercises, such as he has since denounced when practised by 
John Morrissey. Thus each early trained himself to command the ser- 
vices of 'butt-enders' and 'plug-uglies,' as the rowdies of their time 
were called. • Both Tweed and Kelly entered the Board of Aldermen 
about the same time. About the same time, too, they went to Con- 
gress. They ran for Sheriff within a few years of each other's candi- 
dacy. Tweed was defeated. Kelly was elected. While Kelly was 
making bills as Sheriff, Tweed was fraternally auditing them in the 
Board of Supervisors. Tweed became the Tammany Boss, and fell a 
victim to his greed for power and plunder. Kelly succeeded him. But 
here the comparison ends, for Kelly's fraudulent claims were covered 
by the Statute of Limitations, while Tweed was caught and offered 
up as a scapegoat. 

" From the beginning of his public career to the present time, Kelly 
has had the very lowest ideal of the qualities required for the public 
service. He advanced James Watson from a subordinate position in 
the Sheriff's office to one of trust under himself, then to the position of 
County Auditor, where he had the expenditure of millions of public 
money, though he knew the man had been guilty of embezzlement and 
fraudulent bankruptcy. Mayor Havemeyer wgs hardly in office when 
Kelly applied for an appointment for his friend Richard Croker, a 
rowdy and election buliy of well-established fame ; while O'Callaghan, 
once indicted for frauds on the revenue, is Superintendent of Lamps 
and Gas— all by Kelly's orders. Everything shows his fondness for 
advancing the lowest class of politicians. And his standard of official 
honesty is as low as his standard of official responsibility. He had ad- 
mitted that, during his first term as Sheriff, there was no law authoriz- 
ing him to include convictions in the Police Courts in the returns sent 
to the Secretary of State. Yet he did include and charge for them, 
thereby robbing the city of over thirty thousand dollars. He charged, 
at one time, double the rates for conveying prisoners to and from the 
Island ; at another, one hundred and thirty-three per cent, more than 
legal charge. He charged for some eleven thousand vagrants com- 
mitted to the Work House and Juvenile Asylum, a fraud upon the 
Treasury as clear as any bogus bill concocted by his friend Watson, 
and ' put through ' by his former ally, Tweed." 

But to return to the condition of affairs at the beginning 



ORG.WTZATION OF TIIK COUNTY DKMoCliACV. <*)C.5 

of the year 1881. As I liavo before mentioned, a lari^o 
number of citizens wlio bad been life-long Democrats, while 
liaving i)ersonal respect for Kelly, had become weary of 
his nnsnccessful management as a leader, and were especially 
disgusted with existing methods in Tammany Hall, which 
so entrenched the Boss that it seemed impossible to dislodge 
him, exce|3t through some such revolution as that which, in 
the noHtical upheaval of 1871, unseated Tweed. Among 
the Democrats referred to were AVilliatn C AVhitney, Abram 
S. Hewitt, Robert A. Yan Wyck, Edward Cooper, John R. 
Voorhis, Chas. H. Truax, present Supreme Court Judge, 
ex-Comptroller Andrew H. Green, and others, who had set 
their minds upon a practical extinction of the Assembly 
District and General Committee Bosses, through whose 
instrumentality a Grand Mogul was made Boss Supreme. 
The Tammany system, by which, as I have shown in one of 
my early letters, three or four men at a single poll in an 
Assembly District Primary could represent the votes of all 
the Democrats in the whole Assembly District, was known 
to be the mainspring of the evils of Bossism ; and as a 
result of numerous conferences of committees appointed 
at a mass convention of Democrats held at Cooper Union, 
the formation of a new Democratic organization, under 
the auspices of a Committee of One Hundred was 
planned, and secured at once the sympathy and earnest co- 
operation of those Democrats who were dissatisfied with 
existing conditions in Tammany Hall. The system of 
Primary elections in each election district, suggested by the 
Committee of One Hundred, was regarded as in every way 
preferable to the methods of Tammany, because it placed 
within the hands of the people all the machinery connected 
with the management of the organization, including control 
also over the nominations at its command. Its plan, briefly, 
was this : A Primary was to be called, after a public en- 
rollment had been had of all Democratic voters in the 



666 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

district who chose to interest themselves in the work. To 
this Primary all Democrats were to be invited, and they 
were first to organize themselves, and appoint from their 
number three inspectors of election. Then every Democrat, 
who desired to vote for some one to represent him as a 
delegate in the General Committee of the organization, 
was invited to write his name in a book provided for the 
purpose, and opposite thereto the name of the man he 
desired to vote for. The voters who responded to the call 
and signed the book on the evening in question were to 
constitute the Election District Committee, and would 
thereafter, for the ensuing year, elect all delegates to 
Nominating Conventions. This was the basis of the new 
organization ; and as it struck at the root of Bossism — -at 
that assumed power of perpetuation which dominated 
Tammany Hall— the plan and the movement at once be- 
came popular. 

Among the active Democrats who participated in perfect- 
ing the organization, besides those I have already named, 
were Hubert O. Thompson, Oswald Ottendorfer, John E. 
Devlin, Robert B. Nooney, Peter B. Olney, Jordan L. 
Mott, John Henry McCarthy, John D. Crimmius, Edward 
L. Parris, Robert B. Roosevelt, E. Ellery Anderson, Dennis 
Burns, Henry Murray, Townsend Cox, Henry Clausen, 
Wm. Cauldwell, L. G. Garretson, David Murphy, Charles 
L. Beard sley, Thomas Costigau, William Pitt Mitchell, 
Maurice J. Power, Hans S. Beattie, and others. 

The Jeifersonian character of plan of the new organiza- 
tion, which was called the New York County Democ- 
racy, can be best illustrated by comparing it with what 
might be designated the Hamiltonian or Federalist plan of 
organization, which aimed at centralizing power in a few 
persons, and of which Tammany Hall had so long been a 
conspicuous example. Nothing akin to the close corpo- 
ration of -Tammany ELall — the Committee on Organization, 



SECESSIONS FROM THE WKlWAM. <W5r 

of twentv-fonr lucmbcrs — was permitted uiuler the County 
Dciiioeracj jdan ; and such work as was done by tlie Tam- 
many Committee on Organization was to be entrusted to 
a Committee coiisisting of six hundred and seventy-eight 
members, with no possible opportunity for central manipu- 
lations, and with ample facilities for the Democrats of every 
small neighborhood to participate in the full and final 
arrangement of the machinery of party government and 
party nominations. 

Among the notable secessions from Tammany Hall at 
the beginning of 1881 were the representatives from 
twenty-seven election districts of the Fourth Assembly 
District, who, at the house of then Assemblyman (now 
Judge) J. H. McCarthy, 283 Madison street, formed the 
Thomas Jefferson Association of the Fourth Assembly 
District, and elected Alderman Thomas Shells its Presi- 
dent. But, before sundering their relations with the old 
"Wigwam, a large number of Tammany men desired to 
bring about a reformation in the old organization; and 
as its fountain-head was the Tammany Society, a move- 
ment was set on foot, early in the month of April, 1881, to 
turn out the old Sachems and elect a new Board at the 
annual election then close at hand. A meeting was ac- 
cordingly held at Teutonia Assembly Kooms, on Third 
Avenue, within a stone's throw of Tammany Hall, which 
was attended by (among others) Judge McAdam, Robert 
A. Van Wyck, ex-County Clerk Loew, W. C. Traphagen, 
Malcolm Campbell, Civil Justice Timothy J. Cam])bell, 
ex- Assembly man Ambrose H. Purdy, ex- Judge Barbour, 
ex-Senator Chas, G. Cornell, Capt. Isaiah Rynders, John 
T. McGowan, ex-Alderman Tuomey, F. F. Marbury, ex- 
Senator Jacob Gross, Aldermen Shells, Cavanagh and 
Murphy, ex-Judge Koch, R. B. Martine, Col. Gilon, ex- 
Coroner Flanagan, Douglas Taylor, Major D. S. Hart, John 
K. Perley, Park Commissioner Olliffe, John Van Glahn? 



66S THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK TOLlTICS. 

ex-Judge Aekert, Elliott Sandford, Dr. Morkle, TT. IT. 
Porter, ex-Judge Ledwith, Nicholas llauglitou, ex-Speakor 
Hitcliuiau, ex-Congressmau H. C. Calkins, Geo. W. Me- 
Leau and Eicliard J. Morrison. 

Judge Mc Adam was called to preside at the meeting, and 
made a spirited address, stating as a closing remark, which 
voiced the sentiments of all present, that they " were 
assembled to determine whether the power that had ruled 
the Tammany Society for a number of years, and so dis- 
astrously to the Democratic party, should be allowed to 
continue, or whether there should be a change in the ruling 
power.'' Then a committee was appointed to prepare an i 
address, and another committee to select new officers to be : 
voted for at the then ensuing election of the Society ; audi 
the ticket so agreed upon and a copy of the address were 
sent to every member of the Tammany Society they 
could reach. The names agreed upon for new officers - 
were as follows : Sachems, Isaac Bell, James D. Fish, 
Robert A. Yan Wyck, Randolph B. Martine, Patrick 
Keenan, W. C. Traphageu, Chas. G. Cornell, Jordan L. . 
Z\Iott, Anthony Eickhoif, Christopher C. Baldwin. Thomas 
Shells, Gilbert ]\f. Spier, Jr., Shepherd F. Knapp. For 
Seotrfari/, Edward Gilon. For Treasurer, Arthur Leary. 
For Sa^jamore, John K. Perley. For Wiskhisl-^'e, James 
R. Wilson. The address which had been prepared was in 
these words : 

"Brethren: You are earnestly requested to attend the annual 
election of the Tammany Society, to be held on Monday, April 18, 
ISSl. at seven o" clock, p. m., and to vote the enclosed ticket. It is not 
presented to your support from any hostility to any man or set of men, 
to revive or continue any past or present animosity or prejudice, nor to 
accomplish personal or sinister motives of any kind. The time has 
come when it is more thaa ever the duty of every Democrat to exert 
his individual efforts and influence to harmonize and consolidate the 
Democratic party and enable it to achieve the success to which it i3 
entitled. It would be useless 1 1 waste words upon the cause of dis- 
aster • the result onlv need* consideration. 



CONTEST FOR CONTROL OF THK TAMNfANY SOCIETY. 069 

" With more than one-half of the voters of the country in its favor ; 
witli a record of devotion, from tlie time of Jefferson until now, to the 
great principles of liberty and human rights, which are deeply grounded 
in the hearts of the American people, and with a candidate who had 
tlic affection and confidence of all, the Democratic party was defeated 
in the recent election for President, and the cause of that defeat was in 
the City of New York. There should be no possibility allowed for the 
recurrence of such dishonor. In the luipe of leading to a brighter day, 
the enclosed ticket has been put in nomination. It will not seek to 
pull down any man or clique, nor to set up another. Its sole endeavor 
will be to make Tammany Hall a .source of Democratic harmony and 
success, and not of discord and defeat. 

"As members of our ancient Society, it is also our duty to labor for 
this end. If Tammany Hall is to be used for any man's ambition or 
revenge ; if it is to be a bludgeon by which a fatal blow can be given 
to the Democratic party when victory is in its grasp ; if what should 
be the very citadel of Democratic strength is to be the post of danger, 
the Tammany Society will cease to exist, for there will come from 
ever}" part of the United States a strong, overwhelming, irresistible de- 
mand that it be crushed out of existence. As brothers of Tammany, 
therefore, as well as faithful soldiers in the great Democratic army, we 
should come togetUer as one man and inaugurate in Tammany Hall the 
policy of union and victory. 

"At least two-thirds of the members of the Tammany Society desire 
a change in its management. You make one of that great majority. 
We appeal to your patriotism, that you will not fail to attend the 
election and do your part in the effort to unite and strengthen the good 
old party we dearly love." 

The addre.s.s sent out was signed by David McAdam, 
cliainnan ; Harvey C. Calkins, Wm. R. Roberts, Henry 
Hughes, T. C. E. Ecclesine, Isaiah Rynders, Joseph Kocli, 
Tlioma.s Dunlap, Anthony R. Dyett, Thomas J. Creamer, 
Tliomas W. Adams, vice-chairmen ; and William Hitch- 
man, Malcolm Campbell and John T. McGovt^an, secretaries. 

Mr. Kelly was very much disturbed by this develop- 
ment, and his Sachems were called together at once to 
make arrangements to subdue "the malcontents," as he 
designated the oppo.sition. The '' machine " ticket, to be 
voted for at the Society election, as then arranged, con- 
sisted of Sfichems John Kelly, Nathaniel Jarvis, Jr., John 



070 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

McQiiade, Albert Cardozo, John J. Gorman, Edward Kear- 
ney, Augustus Scliell, Chas. II. Haswell, Sidney P. Nichols, 
Patrick G. Duffy, Henry D. Purroy, Henry A. Gumbleton, 
John A. Flack ; /Secretary, Joel O. Stevens ; Treasurer, 
Arthur Leary ; Sagamore, Wilson Small ; WisMnsJcie, 
John D. Newman. At the meeting called by Mr. Kelly 
a special committee Avas apjDointed to make all necessary 
preparations for the election, and to see that the machinery 
of the institution was put in good working order. 

Never had there been so large a gathering at any pre- 
vious election of the Society. Seldom were more than 
one or two hundred votes cast on such occasions; some- 
times very much less. At this time more than eight hun- 
dred members were present, and nearly seven hundred and 
fifty votes were cast. The modus ojyerandi of voting was 
as follows : At the left of the Grand Sachem sat the 
Treasurer, behind a large cash-box, and at his left was the 
Secretary with his book of membership. Toward this 
table moved a line of prospective voters which, at seven 
o'clock, reached across the meeting-room in Tannnany Hall 
and down the stairway. As the member at the head of 
the line reached the Treasurer's table, he gave his name 
and handed in a dollar as his poll-tax, under the rules. In 
return, after his name had been verified in the book which 
the Secretary held, he received a ticket with his name and 
a receipt, and this was his voucher for voting. 

To be forewarned was to be forearmed, and it w^s found 
that a large number of the supporters of Kelly had 
been provided with tickets in advance, by the obliging 
Secretary, who was himself a Kelly candidate for Sachem. 
The first part of the " paying line " was mainly made up ofl 
other Kelly men, and to them vouchers were issued with 
great celerity. Further back in the line were the opposi- 
tion voters, and these were delayed by the provoking slow- 
ness of the Secretary in "finding their names." On the 



CHARGES MADE OV AN UNFAIR ELECTION. (\7\ 

otlier side of the I fall was tlie line of voters already sup 
plied with vouchors, who went to the hallot box, which 
was in charge of three tellers; and this line was of course 
kej)t filled by fresh accessions. Among the voters were 
Corporation Coun.^el Whitney, CoMimissioner of Public 
Works Hubert O. Thompson, Recorder Smyth, John Mc- 
Keon, e.\ Mayors Cooper, Tiemann, Guuther, Smith Ely 
and A. Oakey Hall, Congressman Hewitt, Wilson G. Hunt, 
John T. Agnew, August Belmont, Oswald ^Ottendorfer, 
Emanuel B. Hart, and Thomas F. Jeremiah. Wm. M. 
Tweed, Jr., cast an open ballot for the "machine" ticket. 
The nuichine ticket was nuirked by a large, peculiar, 
zig-zag " K " on the outside, printed in blending colors of 
red and blue so that there could be no imitation of it. The 
balloting was kept up until nearly eleven o'clock, shortly 
after which Grand Sachem Schell announced that an in- 
formal count had been made, and asked Mr. Gunther K. 
Ackerman, one of the tellers, to declare the result. Mr. 
Ackerman thereupon announced that seven hundred and 
eleven ballots had been polled, and that all the candidates 
on the ticket headed by IMr. Kelly had been elected, the 
average majority being about fifty votes. 

The ballot-box remained over night in the possession of 
Grand Sachem Schell, Scribe Stevens and Treasurer Leary 
(who constituted another '' returning board " after the 
fashion of Louisiana in 1876). At three o'clock the next 
afternoon those worthies began an official count of the 
ticket, and an hour afterwards announced as the result that 
the "machine" ticket had been elected, the majorities for 
the individuals named on it ranging from seventy-nine to 
one hundred and fourteen votes. 

Then followed charges of an unfair election, and talk by 
that irrepressible litigant, Nelson J. Waterbury, of taking 
the matter to Court to declare the election void, parties be- 
ing willing to swear that there had been repeating, and that 



072 I'lIlRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICiS. 

"it took two hours for voters of the opposition ticket to 
get their ballots in the box, while the Kelly men got tickets 
already prepared for them without delay." Judge Mc- 
Adam, in fact, stated to a reporter that " many members 
who would have voted the opposition ticket were either 
crowded out of line, or could not wait for an opportunity 
to cast their ballots. Otherwise the opposition ticket 
would have been elected." But the fact was that a good 
many of the anti-Tammany people, members of the Society, 
were, for purely selfish reasons, opposed to depriving Kelly 
of power in the Tammany Society at this time. They 
took the ground that he was so detested by the Democracy 
of the State, on account of his treachery to the party in 
1879, that the Tammany organization would be less potent 
under his leadership than under new men. And these par- 
ties did not vote. 

The only collision on the evening of the exciting election 
was between ex-Senator Ecclesine and Edward T. Fitz- 
patrick. While trying to retain his place in the line, the 
ex-Senator accidentally pushed Fitzpatrick, a follower of 
Kelly. Fitzpatrick took umbrage at what he termed an 
insult; some harsh words were interchanged, and an inden- 
tation was made in Fitzpatrick's hat by the ex-Senator's 
cane. 

The result of this election in the Tammany Society, of 
course, settled affairs in that organization for another year, 
and secession from Tammany Hall became a matter of 
daily occurrence ; while all who withdrew found an " open 
door" in the new organization. 

It was on December 28, 1880, that the first steps were 
taken for the formation of a new organization whicli Iiad 
developed into the New York County Democracy ; and on 
October 7, 1881, Abram S. Hewitt issued an address as 
chairman of the Committee of One Hundred, in which he 
stated that the organization then had 26,500 enrolled mem- 



STATE RECOGNITION OF THE NEW ORGANIZATION. 673 

bcrs, ^vas in every respect fully equipped, and had already 
elected delet;ates to attend the ensuing State Convention. 
The New York County Democracy made its political 
debut, as an organization, at the State Convention held in 
Albany, October 11, ISSl. Three sets of delegates claimed 
admission to this Convention from New York City : the 
County Democracy delegates, the Tammany delegates, and 
a full set of delegates fn^m what was known as the " home 
of the sore-heads,'' Irving Ilall — these last being a dis- 
gruntled lot of patriots who desired to be leaders, and, as 
they were not wanted either in Tammany Hall or in the 
County Democracy, held a sort of mutual admiration circle 
in Irving Hall. The State Committee, recognizing the 
basis on which the County Democracy was formed as in 
accord with the system of representation prevailing through- 
out the State, and therefore truly Democratic, after due 
consideration determined to recognize the representatives 
of the new organization as the Regular delegates ; and their 
names were placed on the roll as " sitting members of the 
Convention." But the credentials from the other organi- 
zations were received as contestants, and referred to a 
Committee on Credentials, which committee, through its 
chairman, Eufus W. Peckham, now U. S. Supreme Court 
Judge, reported as follows : 

"Your Committee, upon taking up the consideration of the contested 
delegations from New York, found that there were three delegations for 
seats in the Convention from what were termed three different organi- 
zations in that county — one from Tammany so-called, one from Irving 
Hall, and one from the New York County Democracy. The Com- 
mittee di'termined to hear all gentlemen from all those organizations 
who desired to be heard, and to allow them all the time they wished 
in which to present to your Committee the reasons why they believed 
their particular organization should be regarded as the Regular one. 
In earnest deliberation and patient hearing they passed the time from 
seven o'clock r. m. to one o'clock a. m. and they heard all that could bo 
said or was desired to be said on the part of gentlemen representing 
these diflfcrcnt organizations. After that hearing, your Committee, by 



674 THIRTY YEAES OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

a unanimous vote, decided that the gentlemen now occupying seats in 
the Convention, on the preliminary roll, and known as the New York 
County Democracy delegates, were entitled to seats by virtue Of their 
regularity as delegates from the County of New York, and 1 have been 
instructed by the Committee to present this report to the Convention." 

The report was adopted UDanimously, amid much en- 
thusiasm, the Tammany delegates again being declared 
out of the Democratic fold, as they had been at the 
National Convention at Cincinnati, and of course there 
was plenty of swearii;g ; but there was no " bolt." While 
sullenly submitting to the edict, the Tammany and Irving 
Hall organizations determined to join forces in making 
County nominations, and thus fight their young and suc- 
cessful rival, the County Democracy, to the bitter end. 

Commenting upon this outcome of the State Convention, 
the New York Herald, in its issue of October 13, spoke as 
follows : 

" It is just one month since Sachem John Kelly, stripped to the buflf, 
streaked with red ochre, decorated with cock-feathers, brandishing a 
tomahawk, and howling like a dervish, proclaimed to what he called 
'a coimcil of braves,' in the Tammany wigwam, that 'he should like 
to see the Democratic State Con.vention which would dare to ignore the 
pretensions of Tammany Hall to represent the Democrats of this City 
in the councils of their party.' Well, if Sachem Kelly is to be taken 
literally at his word, he ought to be the best pleased man in the whole 
metropolis, for during the last two days he has been favored with the 
sight of a Democratic State Convention, which not merely has ignored 
that pretension, but has actually kicked him and his followers out, 
without fear of the war-paint, cock-feathers, tomahawk and bowlings. 
But, to judge by the confessions of the Tammany delegation on their 
return from Albany, and by the tone of the organs through which 
Sachem Kelly communicates with the public, the pleasure he has ex- 
perienced is not so great in reality as it was in anticipation. He does 
not seem to ' like ' it, in spite of his challenge for it to happen. * * * 
Tammany Hall and the Democratic party have parted company, by 
virtue of a sentence of excommunication pronounced at Albany, with- 
out one dissenting voice among the four hundred delegates representing 
the sixty counties of New York, and the whole political history of the 
State does not contain a record of a more respectable day's work." 

At the ensuing election, in November, Tammany and its 



I 



TRIUMPH OF THE COUNTY DEMOCRACY. 675 

" shadow," the Irving Hall coterie, it was ulleged, descended 
once more to uiulorhandod jobbery and trading with the 
Republican organization, anxious to outvote in some way 
the County Democracy ; and the Republicans profited l)y 
tlie compact, as they secured the election of a Surrogate 
and four or live minor Judges; but the combined opposi- 
tion of Tannnany and Irving Hall to the County Democ- 
racy organization did not prevail, for, in a straight contest 
on one of the County offices, the County Democracy ex- 
celled the combination by several thousand votes ; while 
five of the seven State Senators elected were County 
Democracy nominees, as were twelve of the twenty-four 
Assemblymen ; Tammany and Irving Hall electing only six 
and the Republicans six; while of the twenty-two Alder- 
men, Tammany had only five, and the Republicans eight. 

You might, perhaps, suppose that after such a positive 
and unmistakable rebuff as Kelly had received at the 
hands of the State Convention, and the recorded opposition 
of at least three-eighths of the members of the Tammany 
Society, he would " take a hint " and depart in peace ; but, 
no ! He had been elected one of the thirteen landlords of 
the Tammany Building, and had an easy majority of the 
thirteen at his back ; so he was still Boss of the situation, 
notwithstanding his successive defeats. 

Tammany was now without political patronage of any 
kind ; the County Democracy had all there was in sight ; 
and, while patronage is a necessity to any new political 
organization, unwisely handled it is also an element of 
weakness. John Kelly, therefore, thought he would wait, 
and see what trumps the next shuffle of the cards might 
turn up. 



LETTER LIII, 

Insecurity of a Sure Thing in Politics — Three Cooks Who 
Spoiled the Broth — How Grover Cleveland Came to 
THE Front as a Gubernatorial Candidate — President 
Arthur and Roscoe Conkling Unconsciously Play Into 
His Hand— Republican Revolt Against Presidential 
BossiSM — Mayor Grace and Some of His Peculiarities — 
Alleged Misrepresentations to Jay Gould and What 
They Cost Him. 

My dear Dean : 

The Democratic State Convention which assembled at 
Saratoga, in September, 1882, was a somewhat unique 
affair, and in its result rather remarkable. At this gather- 
ing, the Democracy of the metropolis again presented a 
double delegation — one from the County Democracy and 
one from Tammany Hall ; but as this Convention was the 
prelude to a gubernatorial election, and as there was a 
general desire to recapture the State from the JRepublican 
party, in order to give encouragement to the Democracy of 
the Union for the Presidential campaign of 1884, the County 
Democracy, while having the stamp of " regularity," for 
the sake of harmony and success readily acquiesced in a 
recognition of Tammany Hall representation, and agreed to 
a division of delegates, which of course avoided the usual 
contest. The strife for the gubernatorial nomination was, 
however, of a most animated character. Roswell P. 
Flower, of New York City (who afterwards filled the 
position of Governor and who recently departed this life), 
was an aspirant at that time for the nomination, and his 
champion was ex-Sheriff James O'Brien, who had, indeed, 
been on a Flower " jamboree " during almost the entire 

676 



BRir.TTT onT.OOK lOi: A (Unr.KN'ATnUTAL NOMINEE. (57^ 

Suinraer season, at Saratoga. Waldo Tlutcliins, of West- 
cliester county, was also a candidate, and one of his principal 
advocates was ex-Senator Cauldwell, who though by the 
provisions of the Act of Annexation of 1874: made a resi- 
dent of New York City, was a constituent of llutcliins' Con- 
irressional District. Grover Cleveland, Mavor of J^utlalo, 
was also an aspirant, and back of him was an enthusiastic 
delegation from Erie county. Gen. Slocum, of Brooklyn, 
was the favorite of the Kings connty delegation. Allan 
Campbell, Comptroller of the City of New York, was put 
in the field by the County Democracy. But the Tammany 
delegates had no caucus candidate, it being understood that, 
until matter had " settled down to a simmer," the delegates 
were to scatter their votes, for policy's sake. 

This was the situation of affairs, when the chairman of 
the Convention announced that " nominations for the office 
of Governor of the State of New York were in order." 
But there is a little inside history, prior to that particu- 
lar moment which causes me to remember the occasion 
with some interest. Waldo Hutchius had represented 
the Westchester District for four years, in Congress, with 
marked ability, and so popular had he become at the Federal 
Capital that he was being talked of by leading men as an 
available candidate for the Presidency. The Southerners 
i-ecognized the fact that New York was the pivotal State in 
a Presidential -canvass, and, in order to win the next battle, 
Waldo Ilutchins, a Democrat, with Liberal Kepublican 
antecedents, who had been a life-long friend of Horace 
Greeley, was regarded the most available man who could 
1)0 nominated ; but, to insure his obtaining that preference, 
it was suggested that he should " win liis spurs " in a contest 
'U)Y Governor of his State. This position of affairs was 
generally understood among leading politicians throughout 
.he Empire State, in touch with the wires from Washington. 
And it was because of this understanding, that Tammany. 



('.78 TTTTRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Hall, through the influence of Augustus Schell (Hutchins' 
old law partner) and John Ivelly, had no candidate at the 
opening of the Convention. The County Democracy leaders 
also were favorably disposed toward Hutchins, and only 
used Allan Campbell's name to cloak tlieir purpose until 
the proper time for action. Hugh McLaughlin, of Brook- 
lyn, had also been consulted, and his disposition was very 
friendly to Hutchins ; but, just at that time, a most violent 
attack had been made by his political opponents upon Gen. 
Slocum, then a Commissioner of the Brooklyn Bridge, and, 
rather as a vindication of him than a serious desire to secure 
him that nomination, the Kings county delegation resolved 
to stand by General Slocum as their choice for Governor. 
Grover Cleveland, as a candidate, was " in for keeps," as 
the boys say. A big brass band and between one and two 
hundred gentlemen, with high drab-colored hats and small 
walking sticks, had come all the way from Buffalo to 
"holler for Cleveland," their popular Mayor and ex-Sheriff, 
and they knew "No North, no South, no East, no West, 
no nothing" but Cleveland. But it is nevertheless true 
tliat, after personally scanning the situation prior to the 
opening of the Convention, their favorite candidate took 
his departure for Buffalo, feeling pretty well assured that 
the nominee would be Waldo Hutchins. Roswell P. 
Flower, v/ho had had the Presidential " bee in his bonnet," 
for some time, and who regarded the Governorship as a 
stepping-stone, was also in the race to stay. Indeed, so 
lively a campaign had he and his friends made, that the day 
before the balloting commenced, all who were not within 
touch of the inner circle were confident that Flower 
w^ould carry off the prize, basing their estimates upon the 
statements of his enthusiastic supporter, James O'Brien. 

The evening before the second day of. the Convention, 
on which the balloting for the nomination was to take place, 
Daniel Manning, chairman of the State Central Committee, 



now OROVER CLEVELAND CAME TO THE FRONT. C>70 

had a conference with TTutchins in regard to the platform 
to he adopted, seeming to take it foi* ijfi'anted that he was to 
he the nominee ; for everytliing pointed that way. This 
mnch was certain : Kelly would have nothing to do with 
Flower, as a candidate, hecanse of his (Kelly's) antipathy 
to O'Brien, Flower's champion ; and Thompson, the then 
leader of the County Democracy, sympathized with Kelly 
in that regard ; and Kelly, just at that time, was not on 
friendly terms with Hugh McLangidin, and therefore Gen. 
Slocum, as the nominee, was out of the question with him. 
]]nt Kelly, who, for reasons stated, really preferred Waldo 
Hutchins as the nominee for Governor, did not regard it 
as good policy to evidence, at the start, favoritism for that 
gentleman, lest it might invite the antagonism of Hugh 
McLaughlin and others who had " bones to pick " with 
him. 

This was the " layout of the cards," to use a sporting 
phrase, the evening before the nomination was made. At 
about midnight, a conference was held in Hutchins' rooms, 
at the Grand Union Hotel, and on " a count of noses " 
there were reported eighty-four votes for him, without any 
support from New York; and these eighty-four, with New 
York's seventy-two, and Kings county' s forty-four, (which, 
it was thought, could be had when needed), were seven 
more than the one hundred and ninety-three votes neces- 
sary to secure the nomination. The number of votes 
allowed, on a liberal estimate, for Flower, was one hundred 
and thirty ; and Cleveland's vote (confined to Erie and one 
or two other Western counties) was estimated at twenty- 
six. But, not long after Hutchins' friends, very mnch 
worn out, had retired, all feeling good over the prospect, 
Manning, chairman of the State Central Committee, the 
acknowledged political leader of the State, visited Hutchins' 
room and gave advice. This advice was, not to show his 
full strength on the first balloting, but to cast a gradually 



680 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

increasing vote, wliicli would draw to Lim the usual com- 
IDlimentarj votes, given in the first and second ballots, and 
prevent these votes going to Flower. Hutchins asked 
Manning to accompany him to Thompson's room, and the 
three had a conference — a conference which, as the result 
proved, was a disaster to Hutchins' ambition. It was de- 
termined that Hutchins should start off with thirty-six votes, 
from the counties of Westchester, Queens, Richmond, Suf- 
folk, Dutchess and Orange ; or, ten more than the supposed 
strength of Cleveland. On the second ballot, he was to 
show a gain of twenty-five or thirty additional votes. On 
the third ballot, to have his full known vote cast — these 
votes being previously recorded, complimentarily, for local 
favorites. After the third ballot, a diversion was to be 
made in Hutchins' favor, by the withdrawal of Allan Camp- 
bell, and the thirty-six County Democracy votes were to be 
cast for Hutchins, which, it was believed, would put him 
ahead of Flower's vote ; while the next ballot would secure 
him the thirty-six Tammany votes, and the Kings county 
delegates would, it was believed, then follow suit with 
forty-four additional votes. 

This was the plan. But it is an old and true saying, that 
"There is many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip." 
Hutchins' immediate friends, when informed, the next 
morning, of the programme he had consented to, did not 
favor it, but as he had agreed to it, and everything had 
been arranged, it was too late to alter it. "When the Con- 
vention met and balloting was commenced, to the utter 
dismay of Hutchins' friends, the delegates from the 
counties of Queens, Richmond and Suffolk, not having 
been advised of the new plan, and still believing that the 
first ballot was to be divided up informally, had con- 
cluded to give a complimentary vote to their Congressman, 
Hon. Perry Belmont, who had especially requested such 
favor ; while the delegates from Dutchess and Orange coun- 



COMPLETE COLLAPSE OF WELL-LAID PLANS. fiSl 

ties, also attacked by the cotnplimcntary fever, had coii- 
ehided to extend the same courtesy to their then Senator, 
Homer A. Nelson. So, when the first balloting was com- 
pk'tod, "Waldo Ilutchins liad only thirteen votes — twelve 
from his own district, (Westchester), and the vote of 
Richard Croker, of the Xew York delegation. On the 
first balloting, John Kelly, to completely hide his hand — 
and regarding him at that time the least likely of all the 
candidates named to receive the nomination — voted for 
Grover Cleveland. 

Never was there such a collapse in great expectations. 
Ilutchins meant well, and Manning, perhaps, also meant 
well, as did Thompson, although it was asserted by some 
sagacious persons that Ilutchins was slaughtered in the house 
of his friends. Having satisfied themselves with "a night- 
cap," Ilutchins, Manning and Thompson at about four o'clock 
in the morning went to sleep, the arrangement of details 
as proposed being confided to a '' confidential " Albany 
man, whom Manning could trust, or thought he could. 
But, either through design or neglect, he utterly destroyed 
the whole plan of action. The weakness of Ilutchins' vote, 
on the first ballot, was regarded generally as " a change of 
base " in the programme of the State Central Committee, 
and in the hurly-burly which ensued, and the danger which 
all felt of the possibility of the nomination of " O'Brien's 
man,'' as Flower was designated, the Tammany delegates, 
following the lead of Mr. Kelly on the first ballot, voted 
on the second ballot for Cleveland. Then the County 
Democracy leaders got panicky, fearing that Kelly had 
" turned a corner " on them, and they changed their votes 
from Campbell to Cleveland. So it was Cleveland, in- 
stead of Waldo Ilutchins, who was indicated as the " coming 
man " on the second ballot ; and on the third ballot Cleve- 
land was nominated. Ilutchins, wlio had such positive 
assurances of success, the night before, was, through Man- 



G83 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ning's interference, " side-tracked," and thus ended liis 
political aspirations. 

Having thus secured the nomination for Governor 
through " a piece of good luck," if nothing else — for, out- 
side of the City of Buffalo, Cleveland w&s then compara- 
tively unknown — he, through a blunder of the Republi- 
can leaders, had " greatness" thrust upon him. President 
Arthur, upon the advice of Conkling, for the purpose of 
defeating a renomination of Governor Cornell and of 
securing control of 'New York, in order to promote his 
second-term Presidential aspirations in 1884, induced his 
then Secretary of the Treasury, Judge Charles J. Folger, 
to accept a gubernatorial nomination, and the wishes of the 
President were complied with, so far as the Pepublican 
Convention was concerned. Apart from the political sig- 
nificance of this step, the defeat of Cornell was a labor of 
love to Conkling, who detested the then Governor. Conk- 
ling, who, like the great Irish statesman, Daniel O'Connell, 
was skilled in applying telling nicknames to his opponents, 
while in Albany on one occasion referred to Cornell, whose 
official residence was on the highest elevation in Albany, as 
" the Lizard on the Hill." But the attempt of the Presi- 
dent to interfere with the affairs of the State, in seeking to 
dictate the nomination for the Governorship of New York of 
one of his Cabinet officers, so incensed the rank and file of the 
Republican party that they simply " sat down " on Presi- 
dent Arthur, and sacrificed Judge Folger, one of the ablest, 
brightest, and purest men on the Republican side in the 
State of New York, just as President Garfield had " sat 
down" on Roscoe Conkling, when the Senator had at- 
tempted to Boss him. Grover Cleveland's majority over 
his opponent. Judge Folger, was nearly two hundred 
thousand. 

You will thus see, my dear Dean, that the resentment of 
the American people against Bossism is not confined to 



ATTEMPTING TO DO -'SMAUT THINGS." 683 

cither party, wlien thero is a fair chance to evidence that 
resontiiicnt at the polls. But, it is much more difficult to 
deal with Bossism in Tammany Hall, when the Boss is vir- 
tually landlord of the estahlishment and can "shut up 
shop " when a malcontent element presumes to show its 
head. 

But now a word or two about Mayor William H. Grace. 
The first time I had the pleasure of meeting that gentle- 
man was at the Presidential Convention, at Cincinnati, in 
ISS"), when I found him actively engaged in a canvass to 
secure the nomination for President for his friend Judge 
Calvin E. Pratt, of Brooklyn, and I was not a little sur- 
l)rised to see that friend, a Supreme Court Judge of the 
State of New York, engaged in hustling around among 
delegates at the different hotels in the furtherance of his 
ambition. Judge Pratt, was a worthy and capable 
Judge, but he certainly lost his head when he became an 
aspirant for the Presidency. I think this was the first and 
last time— certainly the only time within my knowledge — 
that one aspiring to the high honor of a Presidential nomi- 
nation thus publicly engaged in " booming his own boom." 

Mayor Grace was one of those " betwixt and between " 
^Mayors who were never very satisfactory to New York 
politicians. He was a compromise nominee in 1880, as I 
liave shown in a previous letter, and he was credited with 
attempting to do '' smart things." The story is still cur- 
rent concerning his effort, at one time, to ''' blow hot and 
cold " with Jay Gould, and it portrays something of the 
vindictiveness of one who occupied a position of much 
prominence in financial circles. 

During the session of the Legislature of 1882 — the year 
of the gubernatorial election to which I have just referred 
— the Elevated Railroads of this city made an effort to 
secure the passage of a bill to relieve them of what they 
claimed was excessive taxation. The bill was submitted in 



684 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

advance to Major Grace and Comptroller Allan Campbell, 
and it is alleged was approved by those officials. Not long 
afterwards, one of the Mayor's friends suggested to him that, 
if he expected to go before the jieople again as a candidate 
for Mayor, it would not add to his popularity to be regarded 
as the advocate of an Elevated Railroad Exemption Tax bill 
which Jay Gould was said to be engineering. Whether or 
no this idea influenced the Mayor, certain it is that shortly 
afterwards (the bill in the meantime having passed the 
Legislature) he and the Comptroller joined in a communi- 
cation denouncing the measure, as it had been amended and 
passed, and Governor Cornell took advantage of this pro- 
test of the City's leading officials to veto a measure to 
which, Gould afterwards affirmed, he had promised to affix 
his signature. As the story goes, this unexpected action on 
the part of these officials greatly offended Jay Gould. He 
got even with Cornell by contributing all the " essentials " 
to help Conkling and Arthur defeat his re-nomination. In 
the municipal election of 1882, he favored Franklin Edson 
for Mayor and opposed the election of Allan Campbell and 
the Citizens' ticket. Finally, having "knocked out" Cor- 
nell and Campbell, it remained to get even with Mayor 
Grace ; and, at last, his Honor was struck through his 
pocket. Somehow, Jay Gould learned that Grace had 
made a contract to deliver to parties in South America, 
where his firm had large business relations, eight hundred 
thousand dollars' worth of a particular kind of lumber, at a 
fair margin above the market price. When the Mayor's 
firm came to fulfill their contract and collect the lumber 
together, they discovered, to their dismay, that every stick 
of that particular brand had been bought up by Jay Gould, 
who had effectually " cornered " the market. Neverthe- 
less, the contract had to be carried out to the letter, and, 
in doing this, Grace was compelled to pay one million 
two hundred thousand dollars for the lumber — a net loss 



GRACE RUNS AFOl't. OF A lUZZ-SAW. 685 

of four Imndred thousand dollars lo Ids (Inn. Tlio Mayor 
was not liiip[»y at the turn taken either hy polities or husi- 
ness, and among the "• smart set" in AVall street, tlie laugli 
was considei-ably on the side of Ja}' Gonld, who had thus 
got even with three men who, lie claimed, had broken 
their word to him, and liad managed to make Grace pay all 
expenses. 

Like all compromise Mayors, Grace had a hard' time 
to satisfy the demands upon him for official patronage. 
( )n the first day of May, 1882, the term of office of a Fire 
Commissioner, a Tax Commissioner, a Park Commissioner, 
a Dock Commissioner, a Ilealth Commissioner, a Charity 
Commissionei-, a Police Commissioner, and City Chamber- 
lain expired ; and Grace having been supported by the 
"miited" Democracy, the "united" were on hand, bright 
and early, for the plums expected to fail from his official 
tree. To show how fair and square he wanted to be, he 
invited all the factions to send him a list of preferred 
nominees for these several places. From Tammany Hall, 
he received the names of J. Nelson Tappen, John Eeilly, 
Henry D. Purroy, Francis Blessing, Dr. J. F. Nagle, 
Thomas F. Grady, H. A. Gurableton, Maurice F. Ilolahan, 
John N. Hay ward, Thomas Foley, Edward C. Sheehy, 
Thomas C. Dunham, Ignatius Buckman and Thomas 
Cunningham. The County Democracy sent in the names 
of Chas. H. Marshall, WnV M. OllifTe, Hugh II. Moore, 
Thomas Costigan, John R. Voorhis, and James E. Morrison. 
The old Irving Hall party, which was being run by John 
Fox and Sheriff Bo we, sent in the names of Plenry H. 
Porter and Nicholas Houghton. There were eight places 
to fill. Tammany had sent in the names of fourteen ex- 
pectants ; the County Democracy had forwarded six, and 
Irving Hall two. The Mayor had all these names sent in 
so that he could '' act fairly " toward all. The following 
are the nominations he made to the Board of Aldermen : 



6S6 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

For Ciry Chamberlain, J. Nelson Tappen, (Tani.); fur Fire 
Commissioner, Henry D. Purroy, l^Tam."^ ; for Park Commis- 
sioner. "Wm. M. Olliffe, (County Dem.) ; for Commissioner 
of Charities and Corrections, H. H. Porter, (^Irving Hall). 
He made these four appointments to please the organi- 
zations. Then he nominated four parties to please himself, 
viz., for Police Commissioner, James Matthews ; for Health 
Commissioner, Dr. "Woolsey Johnson; for Dock Commis- 
sioner. X. L. McCready ; and for Tax Commissioner, AV. 
M. Lummis. Of course, as is usual, in attempting to please 
all factions, Grace succeeded in pleasing none ; and when 
the time came for the selection of a Mayoralty nominee in 
the Fall of 1SS2. there was no Grace — either before or 
after meals — for Tammany or the County Democracy. 



LETTER LTV. 

"T.uiMANY "Without a Boss" as a Subterfuge for Making a 
Boss OF A Mayor— Cunning Schemk Which Did Not 
Work — How Aruoganck Came Near AVRECKiNfJ Clkve- 
land's Presidential Aspirations — Exceedingly Close 
Political Contest of 1884 — Conspiracy to Steal New 
York's Electoral Vote — Reluctance of Blaine's 
Friends to Give Up the Fight — Conkling, Blaine and 
Beech ER— Deaths of ARTHuii, Kelly and Thompson — 
All Victims of Grief and Disappointment. 

My dear Dean: 

Subsequent to the election of "Wm. R, Grace for 
!^^a}•or, in ISSO, there grew up in the mind of that gentle- 
man a desire to supersede John Kelly and become a leader 
of the City Democracy in order to pave the way for more 
ambitious projects. In furtherance of that scheme, 
througli his appointee as Fire Commissioner, Henry D. 
Purroy, he commenced a secret warfare upon Kelly in the 
"Wigwam, resulting in Purroy's withdrawal therefrom and 
the organization, in connection with Judge Andrew H. 
White, of a movement known as " Tammany Without a 
Boss," which subsequently, for the sake of brevity, was 
called " liittle Tammany." 

Through the Mayor's manipulation, also, was started a 
Citizens' movement, the original intention of which was to 
renominate himself for Mayor, if an agreement could be 
arranged with tlie County Democracy ; but, as the leaders of 
that organization could not accede to his terms, when the 
time arrived for the election of. Mayor in 1882, the contest 
was between ex-Comptroller Allan Campbell, nominee of 
the Citizens' organization, backed by Mayor Grace and the 

687 



688 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

"Tammany Without a Boss" faction and endorsed by 
the Republicans, and Franklin Edson, a " business man " 
representative of the County Democracy organization, en- 
dorsed by Tammany Hall. The election resulted in the 
sweeping majority of nearly 200,000 for Clrover Cleveland 
as Governor, and the tidal wave carried with it the success 
of the Democratic local ticket, electing Mr. Edson. 

But Mr. Edson proved an unhappy choice for the County 
Democracy, and gave no satisfaction to Tammany ; while 
Grover Cleveland, soon after his inauguration as Gov- 
ernor, in 1883, called around him a political clique 
who succeeded in making him believe that his triumphant 
election was because of his j)ersonal popularity growing 
out of the reputation he had secured as the " Veto " 
Mayor of Buffalo, and he began to assume a dictatorial 
attitude. Then followed serious disaffection among the 
Democratic leaders, especially after Cleveland's insistence 
upon the nomination, by the State Convention, in 1883, 
of Isaac H. Maynard for Secretary of State, in place of 
William Purcell whom the rank and file of the party 
desired to renominate for a second term. Cleveland then 
made a " request " or demand of John Kelly that State 
Senator Thomas F, Grady, who had been too outspoken 
regarding him during the preceding legislative session, 
should not be renominated. To this " request " Boss 
Kelly reluctantly acceded ; a new conflict between the 
County Democracy, which stood by Cleveland, and Tam- 
many Hall, which had " soured " on him, sprang up, and 
there was no union at the polls on local candidates, except 
that for Register, at the election of 1883, which resulted in 
the defeat of Cleveland's dictated nominee, Maynard, by 
about 18,000 votes, while the rest of the Democratic State 
ticket was elected by a majority of about 17,000 — another 
evidence that Democrats as well as Republicans in this 
State (as shown in the defeat of Judge Chas. J. Folger in 



FOLGEH A SACRIFICE TO AntllUR'S AMBITION. 680 

the precedino; Guhornatorial election) will resent every 
attempt at Bossisni on the part of Governor or President 
to dictate State nominations. The following comment, 
made by the New York Tribune at the time of the defeat 
of .Indiro Fol<rer for Governor, will snhstantiate this fact: 

" Prcsiik'ut Arthur knows what the cause of the defeat was. "When he 
inherited the I'ro.><ideucy, after leading a shameful warfare of faction 
against the Chief Executive chosen by the people, he solemnly pledged 
himself to walk in the path and carry forward the policy of his mur- 
dered predecessor. That pledge ho neither kept nor tried to keep. On 
the contrary, he-reversed the policy of President Garfield in every im- 
portant feature, defied the will of the people expressed in the nomina- 
tion and election of that noble leader, used his place and power to 
wreak the vengeance of a malignant faction upon the followers and 
friends of the dead President, outraged public opinion by rewarding 
men who had tried to blacken the name of the departed statesman, 
abused his trust, and prostituted his power, in order t© place a large 
majority of Republicans in subjection to a small minority, and labored 
especially to enable a small faction to dictate to the whole party and to 
the country. The result was a political revolution. No other cause 
can be assigned for the events of the election of 1882." 

At what might be called an " experience " meeting, held 
at Tammany Hall a night or two after the election of 
1883, and presided over by John B. Haskin, the proscribed 
Senator Thomas F. Grady was called upon to make a few 
remarks, when he said, in the course of his address : 

"You know, my friends, that to satisfy the demands of a gentleman 
in Albany, I was not allowed the privilege of running for an office. 
For myself, I am glad that the ' personal comfort ' of the Governor is 
assured fi-r the next two years. The old idea was that a public official 
was a public servant. The new idea is that a public official is a public 
Boss. The verdict of last Tuesday showed what the people think of 
public Bosses." 

It must have been a novelty to the regular attendants at 
Tammany Ilall to listen to a comment upon Bossism 
from the rostrum of that Boss-ridden institution. Such 
was the condition of affairs ]-»olitical in New York, when 
the Democratic State Convention was called at Saratoga 



690 THtRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

to select delegates to the National Convention to be held 
in Julv, 1884, to nominate a candidate for the Presidency. 

The State Central Committee, or a majority of it, with 
Daniel Manning at its head, was in favor of the Presi- 
dential candidacy of Governor Cleveland. Roswell P. 
Flower had been for some time working up a boom for 
himself ; and while, at the Gubernatorial Convention of 
1882, John Kelly unintentionally started the ball which 
made Cleveland the nominee for Governor, in order to 
head off Flower, he was now for Flower for President, with 
the hope of heading off Cleveland, who had given him 
cause for offence ; and Flower's friends (composed chiefly 
of Cleveland " soreheads ") claimed that he had an assured 
majority of the delegates to the State Convention in favor 
of his nomination. 

An amicable adjustment of representation on the part of 
the rival Democratic factions from the metropolis was again 
arranged, without contest — the basis being thirty-one 
County Democracy delegates, thirty-one from Tammany, 
and ten from Irving Hall; and while, in the selection of 
the seventy-two delegates to represent the State in the 
Chicago Convention, there was no instruction to cast the 
vote of the State for Cleveland or any other nominee, the 
"unit" rule, which was re-adopted, virtually gave the 
delegation to Cleveland, as, upon a poll, the delegates' 
preferences were as follows : Cleveland, forty-one ; Flower, 
five ; anti-Cleveland, seventeen ; non-committal, nine. 

The Presidential Convention was held in July at Chicago. 
There was again some talk of Tilden as a candidate ; but 
the chairman of the New York State delegation, Daniel 
Manning, said : "Under no circumstances would he (Tilden) 
have his name considered in that connection " ; and when 
the order of nominations was reached, on July 9, the 
prominent candidates were Thomas F. Bayard, of Dela- 
ware ; Joseph E. McDonald, of Indiana ; Allen G. Thur- 



BITTER RECRIMINATIONS IN CONVENTION. CM 

man, of Ohio ; John (1. Carlisle, of Kentucky ; and Grover 
Cleveland, of !Ne\v York. Tliere being no contesting 
deleirates from the State of New York, the biiBiness on 
hand was much sooner reached than at the ])receding Nat- 
ional Convention, and, except for the little episode be- 
tween Senator Thomas F. Grady and General Bragg, of 
AVisconsin, there was nothing to disturb the harmony of 
the gathering, ^[anning, of New York, in placing the 
name of Grover Cleveland before the Convention on be- 
half of its delegates, called upon Daniel Lock wood, of 
Buffalo, a personal friend of Cleveland, to speak for him, 
and that gentleman made a very eloquent and impressive 
speech in behalf of the Governor of New York. W. Bourke 
Cockran, speaking for Tammany, then stated that, while 
under the unit rule he and his associates w^ere bound to 
abide by the will of the majority of the delegation, they had 
reserved the privilege of expressing their views regarding the 
candidacy of Cleveland. He then followed with a bitter at- 
tack upon New Y^ork's Governor, denouncing him as a mar- 
plot, and one who could not, or would not, carry the State 
of New York. Thomas F. Grady, another Tammany orator, 
delivered a violent and virulent attack against the private 
as well as public character of Cleveland. These assaults, 
emanating from his own State, rather dampened the ardor 
of Cleveland's supporters from other parts of the Union, 
and seemed to give rise to a feeling of doubt as to the ex- 
pediency of his nomination. General Bragg, of Wisconsin, 
a warm advocate of Cleveland, then took the floor. He 
saw it was necessary to do or say something to counteract 
the threatened turn of the tide and, in a full, clear voice, 
which penetrated every nook and corner of the Conven- 
tion, he delivered a very impressive speech in favor of 
Cleveland, adding that the best evidence of his availability 
as a candidate was that the young men of the West as well 
as those of the East were united in his support, and this, to 



692 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

his mind, was Tinmistakable assurance of success. Then, 
pointing to the Tammany delegates, he said : " We love 
him for the enemies he has made." A roar of applause 
came spontaneously from the Convention. Grady jumped 
up, his face red with anger, and shouted back : " In behalf 
of his enemies, I accept your statement." Gen. Bragg 
paused, apparently scrutinizing Grady, and then continued : 
'' Riddleberger, of Virginia, wdiose treachery to the Dem- 
ocratic party caused its defeat in that State, would not be 
permitted to speak here." And, again pointing his finger 
at the Tammany delegation, he exclaimed : " Behold the 
Riddlebergers of New York." The Convention yelled 
again with delight at this thrust. Gen. Bragg then declared 
that if any one searched beneath the cloaks of the anti- 
Cleveland men of Kew York, he could only find dis- 
appointed ambition and personal grievances. He had been 
amused, he said, at the posing of the Tammany delegates as 
the spokesmen of the laboring classes. " Men," he exclaimed, 
in an ironical tone of voice, " have come here, and talked of 
labor, whose only labor has been at the crank of the ma- 
chine." This elicited another roar of applause from the Con- 
vention, which had evidently now again become Cleveland- 
ized. Gen. Bragg concluded his remarks by saying that 
the Democratic party could only win by getting recruits, 
and that the independent voters were willing to come into 
its ranks if they were given a chance. " Every one of 
these men," he said, ''bore a banner with the words in- 
scribed upon it, ' Cleveland and Reform.' " His closing 
sentence was greeted with rounds of hearty applause. 

During Gen. Bragg's speech an incident occurred which, 
perhaps more than his eloquence or sarcasm, turned threat- 
ened defeat into victory. Bragg was the name of a Ca])tain 
in command of the United States artillery at the battle 
of Molino del Rey, during the war with Mexico. At a 
critical moment General Zachary Taylor, dashing past Capt. 



" A LITTLE MORE GRAPE, CAPTAIN BRAGG ! " 693 

Bragg's battery, and seeing the Mexican forces advancing to 
a charge, shouted : '' A little more grape, Captain Bragg'/' 
The phrase became historic in this country, and all school- 
boys are familiar with it, because Bragg's terrific artillery 
lire at that point of the battle secured victory to the 
American arms. When Gen. Bragg of Wisconsin, turned 
on the Tammany leaders in the Chicago Convention, as 
above related, and alluding to Tammany's treachery, 
declared: "Behold the Riddlebergers of New York!" 
a stentorian voice responded from the gallery : " A little 
more grape, Captain Bragg!" As if impelled by an 
electric shock, the entire assemblage sprang to its feet, and 
in a delirium of excitement roared for live minutes, like a 
great tumultuous sea. This settled the fate of Tammany. 
The tide was turned, and Gen. Bragg was the hero of the 
hour. 

The Convention began to take its first ballot at midnight 
on July 10. The result was as follows : Cleveland, 392 ; 
Bayard, 170 ; thurman, 88 ; Randall, 78 ; McDonald, 56 ; 
Carlisle, 27; Flower, 4; Hoadley, 3; Tilden, 1; Hen- 
dricks, 1. There were 820 votes in the Convention ; of 
which the two-thirds necessary to a choice was 547. As no 
choice had been reached, an adjournment was taken until 
the next morning. 

Upon the reassembling of the Convention the next day, 
it was observable that there had been an attempt to 
create a " bandanna " boom during the night for Allen G. 
Thurman of Ohio (who, because of his conspicuous use — 
being a snuff-taker — of bandanna handkerchiefs, was nick- 
named "Old Bandanna,") and there was among his im- 
mediate followers a general waving of handkerchiefs along 
the sidewalks leading to the Convention Hall. But all efforts 
to make a diversion or combination against Cleveland failed. 
A break in his favor from the Randall and Bayard vote 
was announced, and when the second ballot took place, 



694 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Cleveland was nominated, receiving G8-i votes, or 137 more 
tlian necessary for a choice. On this the second ballot, 
Bayard received 81| votes, Ilenricks 45^-; Thurman 4; 
Randall 4, and McDonald 1. The nomination of Cleveland 
was made unanimous, and then followed the excitement 
and enthusiasm incident to all such occasions, and fully 
half an hour was consumed in congratulatory proceedings. 
When order was restored, a recess was taken until evening, 
at which session Thomas A. Hendricks, of Indiana, was 
nominated for Yice-President, and all the business of the 
Convention was then finished. 

Kelly and his delegation from New York City were 
again all " down in the dumps," and next morning de- 
parted from Chicago. Commencing his tight against 
Tilden, in 1876, he had been beaten at almost every Con- 
vention, State and National, since attended by him, and 
now he and his friends left the " Windy City,"' assuring 
everybody that " Cleveland could not carry the State of 
New York." 

But John Kelly and his friends were mistaken in their 
conclusions. For Cleveland was elected, although his suc- 
cess was perhaps less attributable to his personal popularity 
than to a bigoted remark made by Rev. Dr. Burchard, just 
before the election, in the presence of Blaine, which Blaine 
did not resent or repudiate. 

A few weeks before election, a delegation of Protestant 
ministers waited on Blaine at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, in 
this City, to assure him of their loyal support. Many 
prominent Republicans at this time were openly espousing 
the cause of Cleveland, on the ground that he was a tariff 
and a civil-service reformer ; and, to prevent a further 
exodus of Republicans from their camp, these ministers of 
the Gospel, all of whom were Republicans, and with a view, 
perhaps, of exhibiting their importance, conceived the idea 
of ccnferring with Blaine upon the subject of arresting the 



ANOTHER ATTEMPT TO STEAL THE PRESIDENCY. r.05 

exodus referred to. Among several speakers \vlio addressed 
P>laine was Dr. Bureliard, pastor of a Presbyterian Cliurch 
in this City, who, in the course of his remarks, said that it 
was meet that some warning should be given to those mis- 
guided Ile])ublicans who were threatening to drift into the 
party of " Rum, Romanism and Rebellion." 

It is, of course, impossible to say whether or not Blaine 
sympathized with this reflection on a religious conununion 
in which up to this time he had many warm supporters; 
but the fact is, he made no allusion to it in his speech of 
reply to the addresses of the ministers ; nor, although Dr. 
Burchard's remarks were made a prominent issue against 
him during the remaining weeks of the campaign, did 
Blaine even once publicly condemn or repudiate them. 
The American people are always ready to stamp out any 
attempt to inject sectarian issues into politics, and although 
some Republicans may have been kept within the fold by 
the warning of the ministers, Blaine lost heavily on the 
other side among liberal Americans and especially among 
the Catholic Irish element. 

But, I regret to add, a disgraceful attempt was made at 
this election, on the part of the National Republican Com- 
mittee, aided by Jay Gould and the "Western Union Tele- 
graph Company, to steal the Electoral vote of the State of 
New York from Grover Cleveland, much in the same way 
that Samuel J. Tilden, the Democratic nominee for Presi- 
dent, was cheated out of his election in 1876 through 
frauds perpetrated in the States of Louisiana and Florida. 
The following statement will best explain the designs of the 
conspirators who had concocted the plan. I quote from 
the Albany Argus of November 9, 1884 : 

The "address" of the Republican National Committee is a further 
step in the Blaine efforts to lay a foundation for the stealing of New 
York State. Step first was taken in the Jay Gould Blaine Tribune and 
in the Jay Gould-Western Union dispatches. On Tuesday (election) 
night, they showed steady Democratic gains in the rural districts. 



696 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Then sucli words as these began to crop out : "If the remaining dis- 
tricts conform to the Garfield vote, Blaine's plurality will be assured 
in this State." At that time the districts were presumably not " con- 
forming to the Garfield vote." The purpose of the irrelevant and im- 
pertinent interpolation into news dispatches was to let the manager of 
the telegraph know that " remaining districts " must be made "con- 
form to the Garfield vote. " 

To do this, delay was necessary. Suddenly, returns ceased coming 
dntil the next day. Twelve hundred districts had been heard from ; 
seven hundred remained to be heard from. Why were the sources of 
information thus suddenly cut off? The order to "conform to the 
Garfield vote " was understood. So the returns were held back. 

Detecting the trick, the Democratic State and National 
Committees issued an order to every county Democratic 
leader : " Send on the returns to us at once ; see that no 
figures are tampered with ; see that a true statement and 
an honest local count is made." By this means, the figures 
were received before the plotted alterations in them could 
be made, and knowledge of the election of Cleveland 
was obtained. 

Next morning, it was sent out by the Kadical organs that 
" the Republican National Committee claimed the election 
of Blaine " — a bluff to screen the crime going on. In the 
afternoon, the Blaine papers issued extras declaring " Blaine 
elected." These extras were issued from offices which had 
received, but did not publish, cautionary telegrams from 
politicians of their own party in New York, saying that 
Blaine was not elected, and urging the papers for the sake 
of justice and decency, and in the interests of Republican 
honor and public order, not to fall in with the plot to count 
Blaine in by fraud. These extras were issued when the 
papers themselves possessed and suppressed . the figures 
which refuted the very claim put forth that Blaine was 
elected. But still the Tribune continued its claim, and the 
Republican National Committee issued an " address,'' in 
which it was stated : 

There is, therefore, no ground for doubt that the honest vote of 



CONSPIRATORS FOILED. •JO? 

this State has boon jjivon to the IJopublican candidalo : and thoutih the 
defoatod candidate for the Presidency is at the liead of the eh'ction 
machinery in tliis .State, tlie Democratic party, which has notoriously 
been the party of frauds in elections for years, will nut be permitted to 
overthrow the will of the people. 

In the iiieaiitiine a terrible state of excitement was agi- 
tating the whole country, and in the City of New York so 
intense was the feelin<r on the subject that threats of ven- 
geance upon Jay Gould — the head and front of the West- 
ern Union Telegraph Company, the chief link in the con- 
spiracy to steal the Electoral vote of this State — were openly 
uttered, and caused a demand, on his part, for police ])ro- 
tection. Concluding, on the seventh day of November, 
three days after the election, that, after all, "honesty was 
the best policy," and just at that time much the best for 
his personal safety, Gould '' threw up his hands," and 
the bottom fell out of the conspiracy. He then sent the 
following dispatch to Cleveland : 

New York, November 7, 1884. 
Grover Cleveland, Governor, 

Albany. N. Y. 

I hereby congratulate you on your election. All concede that your 
administration as Governor has been wise and conservative, and in the 
larger field as President, I feel that you will do still better, and that 
the vast interests of the country will be entirely safe in your hands. 

Jay Gould. 

But nearly two M'eeks elapsed before the Blaine con- 
spirators would positively acknowdedge defeat. The Kadi- 
cal organs regaled their readers every morning, for three 
days after the election, with the word " victory " in big 
heavy type ; then they hedged a little by saying " the con- 
test is close, but the official canvass will assure Blaine's 
success." As soon as it was generally ascertained that 
Cleveland was elected, the cry of " fraudulent returns " 
was harped upon for several days. But, one morning, the 
" falsehood" editors must have been put on the sick list, for 
nothinjr more was said about the " Blaine Victory," and 



698 'THIRTY YEARS OE NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the returns, as published, showed that Cleveland had carried 
the State of 'New York by 1,047 majority ; and so ended 
the Presidential contest of 1884. 

In the Electoral College, Cleveland had a majority of 37 
votes over Blaine. The State of ISI ew York gave 35 of these 
37 votes. You will thus see that the 1,0-47 majority, which 
gave the Electoral vote of New York to Cleveland, decided 
the Presidential contest. There were at that time eleven 
hundred election districts in the metropolis. A change of 
one vote from Cleveland to Blaine in six hundred of these 
districts would have made Blaine President. Hence the 
importance attached to a single vote by politicians. 

But, besides the attempt to rob Cleveland of the Electoral 
vote of the State of New York, the Presidential canvass of 
1884 was notable for the scandal brought into it. Charges 
of immoral conduct were brought against Cleveland, and 
he was also accused of bad habits during his occupancy of 
the Executive Mansion at Albany. Mrs. Henry Ward 
Beecher was induced to write him a letter stating that his 
numerous friends felt that some explanation of these 
charges was due from him, to which Cleveland replied as 
follows : 

fPRIVATE.] 

Executive Chamber, Albany, N. Y., 
October 7th, 1884. 
My Dear Mrs. Beecher ; 

Your letter, as you may well suppose, has affected me deeply. What 
shall I say to one who writes so like my mother ? I say so like my 
mother, but I do not altogether mean that, for she died in the belief 
that her son was true and noble, as she knew he was dutiful and kind. 
I am shocked and dumbfounded by the clipping from a newspaper that 
you sent me. It purports to give what a man actually knows, and not 
a mere report, as the other four or five lies do, which I have read or 
heard about my life in Albany. 

I have never seen in Albany a woman whom I have had any reason 
to suspect was in any way bad. I do not know where any such woman 
lives m Albany. I have never been in any house in Albany except 
the Executive Mansion, the Executive Chamber, the Fort Orange Club, 



i 

BEECnER'S VIRULENT ATTACK OM BLAlNR. (WO 

(twice at receptions given me, and T think two or llircc oHkt occasions'); 
and the residences of perhaps fifteen or twenty of the best citizunss to 
(line. Of course 1 have been to cliurch. 

I am at a h)ss to i<now how it is th;itsiicli terribly wicked and utterly 
l)aseless lies can be invented. The contemptible creatures who coin 
and pass these things appear to think that the affair which I have not 
denied makes me defenceless against all charges. As to my life in 
Buffalo, the manifestation of confidence and attachment that was ten- 
dered me. there by all the citizens must be proof that I luive not lived a 
ilisgraceful life in that City. And as to my life in Albany, all state- 
ments that tend to show that it has been other than laborious and per- 
fectly correct are utterly and in every shape untrue. I do not wonder 
that your good husband is perplexed. I honestly think I deserve his 
good opinion and any aid he is disposed to render mc. 

I have marked this letter "private." But you must not infer that 
I at all doubt your proper use of it. 

GROVER CliBVELAND. 

As a result of this letter, Kev. Henry Ward Beecher 
entered heartily into the canvass for Cleveland. Although 
Beecher in his day had many shafts of abuse leveled at 
himself, which he always condemned as most unchristian, 
yet he made Blaine the subject of his bitterest invective dur- 
ing the campaign. Not only as a characteristic specimen of 
electioneering vituperation, but in order to show how this 
gentle minister of the Gospel threw the mantle of charity 
over the faults and frailties of Blaine, I must quote from 
Beecher's speech of October 25, 1884, at the Art Associa- 
tion in the City of Brooklyn. After eulogizing Cleveland 
he turned his attention to Blaine and said : 

I want to see that phenomenon of rascality and hypocrisy not only 
beaten, but so badly beaten that his defeat can stand forever in the 
pages of history; that he may hold a place with Benedict Arnold in 
the annals of America, and struggle for fame in the history of humanity 
with Judas Iscariot. 

After pausing a moment to give his audience time to 
drink in these pious and benevolent reflections, the holy 
man continued : 

This country has produced many liars of many kinds. We are even 
famous for our liars. We have the comic liar, who lies for the fun of 
the thing; the malicious liar, who lies to do a neighbor mischief; and 



roo THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS, 

the selfish liar, who lies to fill his purse. Sometimes there is a com- 
bination of all the-e. If there is such a one this minute, he must turn 
green with envy and hide his diminished head when he surveys the 
proportions of that champion of liars, James G. Blaine. 

Of course, Blaine, being a candidate, could make no reply, 
and his own bitter tongue had to be silent. But had he not 
been thus restrained, a reply from him embodying his 
opinion of Beecher, along the same lines, would undoubtedly 
have taken a high place among the classics of Billingsgate. 

Possibly had not Beecher felt protected by Blaine's en- 
forced silence, he would have thought twice before inviting 
a counter attack, especially if he remembered the fierce 
manner in which Blaine handled Roscoe Conkling many 
years before, while yet comparatively a novice in this style 
of controversy. To show what Mr. Beecher escaped it is 
only necessary to give a short extract from a historic 
speech. During a debate on a matter connected with the 
office of Provost-Marshal General Fry, Conkling and Blaine 
becamed involved in a controversy which culminated in 
bitter personalities. Conkling attempted to superciliously 
brush Blaine aside, and referred to him as a person of 
" frivolous impertinence." During the course of Blaine's 
retort, he referred to what he termed a " jocose satire " of 
Theodore Tilton (by the way, an old friend of Mr. Beecher) 
that the mantle of the great orator, Henry Winter Davis, 
had fallen on Conkling's shoulders, and in ridiculing Conk- 
ling for taking the compliment seriously, which he said had 
give.n " an additional strut to his pomposity," Blaine lashed 
him in this way : 

The resemblance is great; it is striking. Hyperion to a satyr, Ther- 
sites to Hercules, mud to marble, dunghill to diamond, a singed cat to 
a Bengal tiger, a whining puppy to a roaring lion ! Shade of the mighty 
Davis, forgive the almost profanation of that jocose satire ! 

During the ensuing twenty-two years, when death separ- 
ated them, Conkling and Blaine never exchanged a friendly 
greeting. 



KELLY'S DL^APPOINTMK.NT AND DKATiL 7("1 

To go back to a diilerciit pha^eof politics, I iiui^' mention 
tliat neither John Kelly, the Tammany leader, nor Hubert 
(). Thompson, the leader of the County Democracy, lived 
to see another Democratic National Convention. John 
Kelly died on June 1, 18S() ITe was taken ill soon after 
the close of the Presidential Convention of 1884, in which 
he had manifested more than usual interest because of the 
fact that his heart was wrapped up in the success of Hugh 
J. Grant, and still more wrapped up in the defeat of 
his enemy William R. Grace, Grant's most formidable 
opponent. Grant was put forward as Tammany's trump 
card for Mayor, he having the prestige of being the only 
Tanmiany Alderman in the Board who did not vote for 
what was called the "Broadway Railroad steal.'" Kelly 
had freely predicted the defeat of Grover Cleveland, and 
undoubtedly believed the prediction would prove true. 
The election completely falsified his prophecy. Cleve- 
land was elected ; so was Grace ; and Tammany's nominee 
for Mayor was defeated. Kelly was a bitterly disap- 
pointed man. He had endured a long strain both physi- 
cally and mentally, and when the end came and brought 
Avith it this crushing disappointment, he broke down. His 
mind was clear, but he was physically prostrate. He could 
obtain no sleep except by the use of opiates ; and early in 
1885 he retired from active politics. 

John Kelly was born in New York City, on April 21, 
1821, and like most boys of his period, as I have before 
stated, was an interested admirer of the old Yolunteer" Fire 
Department. He possessed great physical strength, and was 
an associate and companion in his boyhood of John B. ITaskin 
and David C. Broderick, both of whom, like himself, after- 
wards became prominent in political life. John Kelly first 
entered politics as Alderman, in 1854. While serving out 
his term in that capacity, he was elected to Congress. Be- 
fore the close of a second term in Congress, he was elected 



702 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Sheriff of the County of New York. He afterwards served 
four years' as Comptroller of the City and Comity, making 
in all sixteen years of official life. While in Congress, Kelly 
was described as "a strong, heavy, raw-boned man with a 
firm jaw, clear and determined eyes and awkward manner." 
His associations at the Federal Capital greatly modified his 
deportment. From having been rough, intolerant and 
domineering, he grew to be agreeable in his nature and 
diplomatic in his behavior. John Kelly exhibited a curious 
temperament when dealing with Tuen, At times he was 
cold, austere, and even tyrannical, and once he made up his 
mind to anything, it required extraordinary influence to 
change him. He was a deep thinker, and for a man possess- 
ing such a limited education it was astonishing to all to find 
him ready to discuss almost any subject, particularly if of 
a political nature. He was a rigid disci})linarian in politics. 
In his latter years he became very stubborn, and often lent 
a willing ear to tale-bearers, the falsity of whose utterances 
estranged from him many loyal Tammany men. While sit- 
ting in judgment, in the back-room of the Wigwam, on 
some case that had been presented to him, his face was a 
study. His gaze seemed to be fixed on the opposite side of 
Fourteenth street. He listened intently to what was 
said, pro and con, and spoke in a low, measured tone 
but with marked emphasis, so that those who heard the 
verdict were not likely to forget it for some time. He was 
thoroughly domesticated in his habits. His food was of the 
plainest, and he smoked moderately. His library was his 
smoking room, and a good fragrant cigar seemed to help 
him out greatly with any mental problem of importance. 
In his home, John Kelly was as docile as a child ; the iron 
feati^res became relaxed, and the " Bismarck of New York," 
as he was sometimes called, even condescended to smile. 
For a man of such iron will, Mr. Kelly was easily disap- 
pointed. On one occasion he prepared a lecture on the 



ANOTHER HEART-BROKEN LEADER. TOrt 

" North Anicriean Iiuiiair' — a subject in which lie felt a 
deep interest— and tliis he had intended to deliver exten- 
sively for the benefit of charity. I'nt he was fond of ap- 
plause, and as the lecture did not meet with the enthusiastic 
reception he had expected, he despondingly laid it aside. 
There was no man in the history of Tammany Hall who 
could liave been richer than John Kelly. He could have 
been a millionaire a dozen times over; but he was not 
accessible to those corporation " blandishments " which 
have such a charm for his successor, and he died in 
the moderate circumstances in which he lived, earning well 
the name he loved to hear himself called by friend or foe, 
" Honest John." 

Hubert O. Thompson, like John Kelly, was a victim of 
disappointment. He was only thirty-eight years of age, 
and had been only eight years in public life at the time of 
his death. When Allan Campbell was Commissioner of 
Public Works, he made Thompson a clerk in the Water 
Purveyor's bureau. Thompson afterwards became private 
secretary to Allan Campbell, when Commissioner of 
Public Works. H. A. Gumbleton was then Deputy 
Commissioner of that Department, and when Gumbleton 
was elected County Clerk, Thompson was made Deputy 
Commissioner of Public Works in his place, for which act, 
being contrary to Kelly's wishes, Allan Campbell was 
"disciplined" out of Tammany Hall. In 1879, when 
Governor Robinson removed Gumbleton from the office of 
CouD^ty Clerk, Mayor Cooper appointed Thompson to fill 
his place. Gumbleton refused to surrender his office, claim- 
ing that his removal was illegal. Through his influence 
with the janitor of the building, (who had been appointed 
by the Commissioner of Public Works,) Thompson secured 
possession of the County Clerk's oflice at midnight, for 
which act Gumbleton had him arrested ; but he was soon 
discharged. Thompson was made Commissioner of Pu'oMq 



?04 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Works bj Mayor Cooper, in 1880, and soon after entered 
heart and soul with Wm. C. Whitney, Abram S. Hewitt and 
others into the organization of the County Democracy, and 
with all the vast patronage under his control, in the depart- 
ment of which he was the head, he, with Daniel Manning, 
Chairman of the State Central Committee, really controlled 
the politics of the State. It was Thompson's influence 
more than that of any other man, that secured for Cleve- 
land, in the face of strong opposition, the delegation from 
ISTew York State to the National Convention of 1884, and 
through his influence, in the City of New York, large sums 
of money were subscribed to enable the National Demo- 
cratic Committee to carry out its plans, in which, it was 
said, Thompson invested all his private funds, while he was 
an incessant laborer, night and day, during the Cleveland 
campaign. 

His term of ofiice as Commissioner of Public Works ex- 
pired on December 31, 188-4, and as through some mis- 
understanding with Mayor Edson he was not re-appointed 
for another term, he very naturally turned his attention to 
Cleveland, for whose success he had done so much, and 
Thompson was recommended by the organization of which 
he was the head to the President-elect for the position of 
Collector of the Port of New York. But in this his hopes 
were blasted ; for when, immediately after his inauguration, 
the President was approached on the subject, he broke 
Thompson's heart by saying "he was too much of a poli- 
tician for the position." This was a disappointment equal 
to Kelly's, and perhaps much more keen, because at this 
stage of Thompson's career he was without funds or re- 
sources of any kind. Sucl^ are the vicissitudes of politics. 

Deprived of the olfice which had given him power and 
influence, and disappointed in his hopes through President 
Cleveland, Thompson soon after found that steps were 
"being taken through Mayor Grace and Chamberlain Ivins 



POLITICAL SAGACITY, NOT INGRATITUDE. 705 

to supersede him in tlie j)osition he ht-Ul in the County De- 
mocracy. AVhen Grace became a full-fledged County 
Democracy man upon his non^nation for Mayor in 1884, 
Fire Commissioner Purroy and Judge Andrew 11. AVhite 
followed him into that organization ; and, always reach- 
ing out for extended power, througli the Mayors in- 
fluence the Fire Commissioner sought the position held by 
Thompson, of chairman of the sub-Executive Committee — 
the nearest approach to Boss which the County Democracy 
organization permitted. The effort, though determined, 
was not, however, successful ; but the Fire Connnissioner 
landed next in command, being made chairman of the sub- 
Conuuittee. This move was another blow to Thompson's 
sensitive condition, and nuide him grieve the more over his 
comparatively powerless situation. The announcement of 
his death caused a shock to politicians of both parties, be- 
cause he was socially popular with all of them, lie was a 
man of extraordinarily good judgment and knowledge of 
affairs and of men, and had a good business education. The 
manner in which he was treated by President Cleveland 
surprised everyone. 

It is only fair to say, however, that Cleveland must be 
presumed to have acted towards Thompson from a sense of 
public duty. It was well-known that Cleveland had no 
earthly reason to have any prejudice, personal or political, 
against Thompson. On the contrary, they were on terms 
of personal and political friendship. Thompson himself 
did not regard Cleveland's refusal to appoint him as based 
on anything of a personal nature ; for, a couple of days after 
Cleveland's inauguration, he said to a friend, " No, I won't 
be made Collector of the Port of New York. The President 
thinks I am too much of a politician." But this was not the 
cause of his rejection. The reason is here. Thompson 
had been Commissioner of Public Works of the City of 
New York. Ilis salary was $8,000 a year. He lived at the rate 



706 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of $50,000. He was not rich outside of his office, nor was 
his family rich, or even well oS. " Where did he get it i " 
was in Cleveland's mind, tli^ same as " Where does Croker 
get it ? " is in the mind of every man to-day. In the flush of 
his prosperity, surrounded by sycophants and schemers, in- 
grates and traitors, Thompson in his simplicity supposed 
that the people were blind or were fools, and that his ex- 
hibition of affluence was not proof of his wrong- doing, 
strong, positive and unanswerable. Besides, the public 
press openly denounced his management of the Department 
of which he had been the head. Under the law, all con 
tracts for the City, over $1,000 in amount, were to be let by 
public bidding (duly advertised as to time and place) to the 
lowest bidder. A contract under that sum, or for $999, 
could be awarded to any person in favor with the Commis- 
sioner of Public Works. During Thompson's adminis- 
tration a large number of these small contracts were awarded 
to two favorite contractors, Maurice B. Flynn and Richard 
A. Cunningham, and, to better accomplish the purpose in 
view, works which could and should be let in bulk were in- 
geniously divided into fragments, so to speak, in order to 
bring the several contracts outside of the operation of 
the statute requiring public letting and advertising. 
So that the aggregate work of these favorite contractors 
was very great, and the profits enormous ; and this is 
one of the ways Thompson was supposed to "get it." 
Before Cleveland would appoint a person to the im- 
portant post of Collector of the Port of New York, it is 
reasonable to presume that he would look closely into his 
character as well as capacity. With Cleveland's well-known 
disposition to make no compromise with dishonesty, it is 
also reasonable to presume that Thompson's own conduct, 
and this alone, was the cause of his failure to reach the 
office. 

I may mention, before concluding, that the year 1886 was 



OTHER CHIEFTAINS PASS AWAY. 707 

a fatal one to still another iiian prominent in j^olitical life, 
whoso name lias frequently appeared in these letters. 
1 refer to ex-President Chester A. Arthur, another dis- 
appointed man, who played a high game for the Presidential 
succession, but with Folger's defeat for the Governorship 
all his hopes vanished. He died suddenly of apoplexy on 
Xov. 18, 1886, and, in less than eighteen months thereafter, 
his bosom friend, Roscoe Conkling, departed this life on 
April 18, 1888; while Folger, their gubernatorial victim 
of 1882, survived his terrific defeat less than two years, 
dying on September 4, 1884, just before his successful 
competitor was advanced to the Presidency of the United 
States. 

Thus four prominent political leaders passed out of 
existence in less than two years. The County Democracy 
existed more or less (generally less) for several years after 
the death of Hubert O, Thompson, its light gradually 
growing dimmer, until it finally flickered out under the 
leadership of Charles E, Jackson. Senator Thomas C. 
Piatt succeeded his old associate, Roscoe Conkling, as 
Republican Boss, and seems to have proven a much greater 
success in that line ; while Richard Croker, an humble de- 
pendent of John Kelly, has become the successor of that 
leader as Boss of Tammany Hall. But regarding him 
there is so much to say that I shall defer my remarks until 
another time. 



LETTER LV. 

Fickleness of Popular Favor— President Cleveland Ap- 
plauded AND Commended, but Defeated in His Own 
State— Singular Apathy at the Nominating Conven- 
tion—Politicians Unwillingly Subbiit to Uncontrol 
lable Conditions, but Handicap the Nominee with an 
Unpopular Platform — Strife of Governor Hill's 
Friends to make Him a Presidential Nominee in 1892 — 
How They Marred His Changes by a "Snap" Conven- 
tion — Cleveland Nominated a Third Time for the 
Presidency— The National Contest of 1896. 

My dear Dean : 

The fickleness of popular favor finds signal illustration in 
the public career of ex-Presiclent Cleveland. When Mayor 
of Buffalo and comparatively unknown outside of Erie 
county, he was elected Governor of this State, in 1882, by 
a majority of nearly 200,000 ; but when nominated for 
the Presidency, in 1884, he carried this State by a ma- 
jority of only 1.047 votes. When renominated, in 1888, 
he was defeated in this State, and lost his election as 
President ; yet four years thereafter, in 1892 — Cleve- 
land meanwhile having resumed the practice of law in 
New York City — he was again nominated for the office 
of Chief Executive, again carried the State of New 
York, and was again elected President of the United 
States. His nomination for Governor seemed to be mere 
chance or accident, as I have shown ; his nomination for 
President in 1884 was due to the timely speech of Gen. 
Bragg in the Democratic National Convention of that year ; 
while his first election to the Presidency was generally 
believed to have been mainly due to the chance utterance of 

708 



FICKLENESS OF POPLl-AR FAVOR. 703 

'' Ilinii, Ronianisin niul liebellion " l)j Rev. Dr. iiurcliiird, 
at a Blaine reception, and wliicli lost Blaine many votes. 

In reflecting npon foregoing strange coincidences, and 
having in view present political conij)lications, the sugges- 
tion forces itself upon the mind, that perhaps "destiny" 
has not yet got through with Cleveland, 

Cleveland's re-nomination in 1888, for President, was 
not due to love or regard for him on the part of the leaders 
of his party. On the contrary, while not betraying the vul- 
garity or insolence of an uneducated Boss, he had become 
injperious and somewhat dictatorial in his official position, 
and his determination not to permit his Administration to- 
be characterized by partisan favoritism led him into antag- 
onisms with many political friends; but this independ- 
ence made him strong with the people and, combined 
with his power and influence, forced all other aspirants for 
the Presidency out of the held, compelling the Democracy 
to re-nominate him ; yet an unpopular plank in the party 
platform defeated him. But the ensuing four years brought 
another change. The hue-and-cry raised against the 
]\IcKinley high tariff, passed during the Administration 
of his successor, President Harrison, and the beginning of 
"hard times" in 1892, turned the popular mind in the 
direction of tariff reform and toward Cleveland as its 
best exponent, and he was again called to the White 
House. Four years later, in 1896, William McKinley, origin- 
ator of the tariff in opposition to which Cleveland was 
re elected in 1892, was brought to the front by the Repub- 
licans as a cure-all for the then existing business depression — 
wrongfully attributed to Cleveland's too much tariff reform 
proclivities — and McKinley was elected to the Presidency. 
Such are the ups and downs of puldic men, and the con- 
trarieties of the popular mind in regard to public issues. 

As I have previously referred to Presidential Conventions 
from 1868 to 188J:, I may now add a brief reference to mat- 



710 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ters of interest connected with tlie Conventions of later 
years. 

The Democratic National Convention of 1888 was held 
in Jnne — the month usually selected for such gatherings, 
both because it is a month of more or less leisure through- 
out the country, and because a canvass of four or five 
months is deemed necessary for a Presidential campaign. 
The IST. Y. Democratic State Convention to select delegates 
to the National Convention was held at the Academy of 
Music, in this city, on the 15th day of May. Between 
David B. Hill, then Governor of this State, and President 
Cleveland, differences had arisen. The Governor had began 
to turn wistful eyes toward Washington, but Cleveland 
was not yet ready to quit the Presidential arena, and when 
he discovered, in the month of February, that the Governor 
had quite as many friends as he in the State Committee, he 
began to plan accordingly. "When, at the State Convention 
to select delegates to the National Convention, it was found 
that the Governor was arranging to go as a delegate-at-large 
— in order to be on hand, in case of an emergency like that 
of Garfield, in the Republican National Convention — Cleve- 
land determined to balk his purposes, which he did, the 
delegates-at-large chosen being Edward Bissell, of Buffalo, 
Cleveland's old law partner, and Oswald Ottendorfer, 
editor of the New York Staats Zeitung, both pronounced 
Cleveland advocates. 

Ex-Mayor Wm. R. Grace was conspicuously active at the 
State Convention against Governor Hill, to satisfy a fancied 
wrong, and when the Governor's defeat was accomplished, 
ex-Mayor Grace was almost beside himself with joy, until 
his attention was called to certain pamphlets that were 
being distributed among the delegates. One of these was 
entitled " A One-Sided History of Wm. R. Grace, the 
Pirate of Peru ;" the other was entitled 'An Address to 
the Delegates by a Member of the Convention," and con- 



A LIFELESS NATIONAL CONVENTION. 71l 

tained a savage attack on (Iraco and William G. Wliitnev. 
Tliiri was an act of retaliation ou the part of some of Iliirs 
friends, but that gentlenum denounced, as did almost every- 
one else, the anon^'inous character of the attack, as well as 
its extraordinary brutality and violence. The State Con- 
vention, presided over by Frederic R. Coudert, endorsed 
the Administrations of President Cleveland and Governor 
Hill, and instructed the delegates, chosen to represent the 
State at the St. Louis Convention, to vote for the re- 
nomination of Grover Cleveland for President. To show 
how evenly the sentiment of the Convention was divided, 
I may add that, when the new State Committee selected 
by the Convention met for organization, the vote for chair- 
man was a tie between Judge D. Cady Herrick and Edward 
Murphy, afterward United States Senator. "Why was not 
Mur])hy again elected cliairman ? " a prominent Democrat 
was asked. " Because the Administration thinks he is too 
close to Governor Hill," was the response. But at the 
next meeting of the Committee Senator Murphy was made 
chairman. Although emanating from an opposition partisan 
source, the following comment on the political situation, 
from the New York Tribune of May 16, 1888, may bo 
interesting : 

The Democratic party needed a leader, but has found a master. 
The events of the past year have a peculiar interest for the philosophi- 
cal student of parties and party government in a Kepublic. President 
Cleveland dictates to the Xew York Democratic Convention as abso- 
lutely, with as little effective resistance, and with as contemptuous in- 
difference to the wishes and interests of intelligent Democrats, as if he 
were overseer on a plantation and Democrats were his slaves. Gov- 
ernor Hill, of whom some have talked as the possible leader of an in- 
surrection, feels the lash and bears the humiliation of a public Hogging 
as best he can. Without hira, Cleveland could never have become 
master of his party, for it was Hill's victory last year that made Cleve- 
land's dictation possible. But Manning was discarded and humiliated 
before him, and but for Manning the e.^-Sheriff of Erie would long ago 
have disappeared in oblivion. The men who climb without merit are 
those who kick away the ladders without compunction. 



713 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

The Presidential Convention, when it met at St. Louis, 
Mo., on June 4, was the tamest affair of the kind I had 
ever attended. It seemed to be, and yet it was not, a cut- 
and-dried affair, though tlie re-nomination of the President 
was apparently a foregone conclusion. There was no Cleve ■ 
land enthusiasm. It did not exist. Ex-Governor Tilden, 
cold, selfish and unmagnetic as he was, still by the great 
power of his intellect and politic management inspired an 
admiration of which there was not the slightest sign in the 
case of Cleveland. When a party leader is popular, you do 
not need to be told of it. There is electricity in the 
very air on such occasions as a Presidential Convention. 
There was no Cleveland thrill anywhere. Any one who 
has ever heard the roar that would break out from a Demo- 
cratic crowd at the sight of Horatio Seymour's face, or the 
mention of his name, need not have explained to him 
the difference between enthusiasm and the feeling with 
which Cleveland was regarded at the Convention of which 
I am speaking. There seemed to be only fear, not love for 
him — a sort of formal acquiescence in the inevitable. Tilden 
never had the despotic power in the organization which 
every detail of the Convention showed that Cleveland was 
wielding ; because, perhaps, Tilden never had the patronage 
at his command. 

The Exposition Building, in which the Convention 
was held, was a huge and imposing structure of stone, brick 
and iron, capable of seating ten thousand people. It was 
elaborately^ decorated, and the location of the presiding 
officer, on the side, about midway of the immense hall, 
made it possible for the vast assemblage to hear what 
was said and see what was done. There was little talk of any 
candidate except Cleveland, although a delegate from Ne- 
vada was observed tying to the pole that bore the name of 
his State, a red bandanna handkerchief, to show that the 
delegates from that locality were friendly to " Old Ban- 



CLEVELAND'S SECOND NOMINATION. 713 

daiina '' ex-Senat<ir Allen G. Thiinnan, of Ohio. Other 
Stato poles were aftersvard similarly decora.ted. Then 
an advocate of Governor (i ray, of Indiana, just to show that 
a boom for that gentleman, if not very much alive, was at 
least still kicking, perched his gray stove-pipe hat on the 
Indiana pole, and soon thereafter a numher of gray hats 
were seen shaking on canes. 

Judge J. M. AYhite, of California, the temporary presid- 
ing officer, wielded a silver gavel presented by the State of 
Nevada ; and the routine business of the Convention, occu- 
pying the first day, passed off without a ripple of discord. 
The next day. General Patrick A. Collins, of Massachus- 
etts, was made permanent Chairman, and, without waiting 
for a report from the Committee on Platform, announced 
that nominations for the office of President of the United 
States were in order. As the secretary stepped forward to 
call the roll of States, Edward W. Pelters, of Alabama, 
said : " Mr. Chairman, the delegation from Alabama have 
instructed me to tender its first place on the call, and its 
first right to speak, to the State of New York." Great ap- 
plause greeted this act of courtesy, and Daniel Dougherty 
of Pennsylvania, to whom the honor had been accorded, 
delivered a well-set speech eulogizing the ex-President, and 
at its close he put in nomination, in behalf of the delegates of 
the State of New York and Pennsylvania, Grover 
Cleveland. 

For the first time was there an ebullition of enthusiasm, 
and as each State was called, and the votes were recorded 
for Cleveland, delegates from all parts of the hall gathered 
around Dougherty, bearing the standards of their re- 
spective States, and formed a circle about him holding, as 
a sort of canopy over his head, the placards bearing the 
names of the States. The number of votes necessary to 
nominate Cleveland were recorded long before the roll- 
call was finished. Then a formal announcement of thQ 



714 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

nomination of Cleveland was made by the cliair, aad 
an adjournment of the Convention was had for the day. On 
re-assembling the next day, ex-Senator Allen G. Thurman, 
of Ohio, was nominated for Yice-President ; after which a 
platform with an unsatisfactory tariff plank, reported by 
Henry Watterson, of Kentucky, chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Resolutions, was adopted, amid considerable con- 
fusion, and the'Convention, with a kind of "wet-blanket" 
feeling among the delegates, adjourned sine die. 

Senator E-iddleberger, of Yirginia, (to whom you may re- 
member, Gen, Bragg, of Wisconsin, referred, in liis great 
speech in the Convention of 1884, which first nominated 
Cleveland) when asked, in "Washington, what he thought 
of the Democratic nomination for Vice-President, Allen G. 
Thurman, "Think," he answered, "why, that you have 
nominated a pocket handkerchief ! " 

May<5r Hewitt, of ITew York, one of the most ardent 
supporters of Cleveland in 1884, while the Convention was 
still in session in St. Louis, was thus addressed by a promi- 
nent Democrat : 

"Mr. Mayor, you drew up the tariff plank in the platform of the 
Democratic Convention of 1884 ? " 

"Yes, I did." 

" Have you prepared a tariff plank for the St. Louis Convention ?" 

"I have not prepared anything for the Convention, and I shall do 
nothing about it, nor about the canvass; I shall not make a speech, nor 
spend a dollar in the campaign." 

" As a . Democrat, will you not do all you can for Cleveland's re- 
election should he be re-nominated ? " 

"No ; I shall not vote for him," 

" For what reason, Mr. Mayor ? " 

"Because he is no statesman, and I don't believe in his re-election." 

" Don't you think Mr. Cleveland will be re-elected '? " 

" He may ; but not by my vote." 

The Mayor seemed to be inflicted with an " ugly fit," for, 
when informed that nearly three hundred officials of the 
City government were absent at the St. Louis Convention, 
he said : 



NEW YORK 'V\IK PIVOTAL STATE. 715 

"The Mayor 1ms uo power over auy of tlif ofl]cial.s alluded to. Hut, 
if complaint should be made to me, and it were shown that the neg- 
lect charged has re.sulted from a Commissioner's absence, I should 
promptly remove him ; or if all the Fire Commissioners should leave 
the City at once, I should .^igu an order for their removal instantly, and 
leave the responsibility with the'Qovernor." 

But, while tliere was antagonism on the part of old friends 
in the Democratic ranks, Cleveland had the ardent ad- 
vocacy of a large class of Kepublicans who were in favor 
of tariff reform, and who were styled " Miigwiimjis," 
although it was claimed that even these deserted him at the 
last moment. Be this as it may, a " business scare " was 
again worked up by the Kepublicans, taking the evasive 
tariff plank of tlie platform of the Democracy as a text ; 
and the result was that Benjamin Harrison (grandson of the 
Gen. Wm. H. Harrison who was elected to the Presidency 
in 1840), was elected President, receiving 233 Electoral 
votes. Cleveland carried every Southern State in addition 
to Connecticut and ISTew Jersey, while Plarrison carried all 
the other Northern States. It is a singular fact that Gen. 
Harrison received a majority of 12,096 votes in the State of 
Xew York over Cleveland ; while at the same canvass 
David B. Hill (Dem.) was re-elected Governor of the State 
by a majority of 18,481 over IT. S. Senator Warner Miller, 
the Republican nominee for Governor It may be worthy 
of mention that had Cleveland received the 36 Electoral 
votes of the State of Xew York, he would have been elected 
instead of Harrison. 

Cleveland, as I have stated, ran many thousand votes be- 
hind Hill; and, considering his defeat a political "finish," 
a manufacturer of rhymes contributed the following 
stanzas to the New York Tribune of November 9, 1888: 

Stand up, dejected Democrats, and sing a party song ; 

For Grover Cleveland and Free Trade your hopes you've cherished 

long. 
Oh sing a song of sorrow, all solemn-like and slow, 
For Harrison the fight has won, and Grovcr's got to go. 



716 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

The Mugwumps all will join you, as you wail your parting strain, 
For place and power no evil hour shall bring to you again ; 
The loyal North has tried your worth, your policy we know ; 
Your Rebel schemes and Free Trade dreams ; and Grover's got 
to go. 

Now, a word or two in conclusion abont succeeding Presi- 
dential elections. In 1891, the friends of Governor Hill, 
who had managed to secure control of the State Cen- 
tral Committee, determined to avail themselves of their 
opportunity to advance his claims as a Presidential aspirant. 
Grover Cleveland had had two nominations, in one of which 
he was successful by the slender majority of 1,047 votes in 
this State, and in the later contest he had been defeated in 
this State by a majority against him of 12,096 votes, 
while, at the same time, as I have stated, Hill had been 
elected by over 18,000 majority. Hill and his friends 
therefore thought it was time for Cleveland to stand 
aside, and as the vote of the State of New York was neces- 
sary for any Democratic nominee for the Presidency, in 
order to be successful, Hill, who had been Cleve- 
land's running mate, as Lieutenant-Governor, when he 
had been elected by the overwhelming majority of 
nearly 200,000, and who had since that time twice been 
elected Governor, ought to have an opportunity to secure 
the Presidential nomination, having evidenced his popu- 
larity in two hotly-contested elections. 

Contrary to all precedent — State Conventions for the 
selection of delegates to a Presidential Convention never 
theretofore having been held earlier than about the middle 
of April — the State Central Committee, under the control 
of HilFs friends, issued a call for a State Convention to be 
held on February 22, 1892, at Albany, which was at once 
stigmatized by Cleveland's adherents as a " Snap Conven- 
tion," and was regarded throughout the country as an at- 




David B. IIili. 



" SNAP " AND " RUMP " STATE CONVENTIONS. 71? 

tempt on the part of Ilill to inaui,'unitc Taimiiany Hall 
tactics in Presidential politics ; and while it enabled, as was 
intended, Hill's friends to control the State Convention and 
secure to him delegates to the Presidential Convention, it 
also permitted the opponents of that gentleman to start a 
Cleveland boom against him, which rapidly spread through- 
out the country. The New York County Democracy still 
had a strong partiality for Cleveland, and rebelling 
against this mid-Winter call of the State Central Com- 
mittee, they determined to take steps to circumvent it. 

Theliegularor '' Snap ■' Convention assembled at Albany 
on the day named, February 22, and after making Gen. 
Daniel E. Sickles chairman, appointed 72 delegates to the 
Democratic National Convention to be held at Chicago on 
June 21, all in favor of the nomination of Hill for President. 
The anti-Hill or pro-Cleveland New York County Demo- 
cracy people had organized what was called a Provisional 
State Committee ; and, under a call from that body, a 
State Convention to select delegates to the National Con- 
vention was held at Syracuse on May 31. In this movement 
ex-Mayor Wm. R. Grace, Judge Henry R. Beekman, Judge 
Francis M. Scott, ex- Attorney General Chas. S. Fairchild, 
U. S. Sub.-Treasurer Chas. J. Cauda, E. Ellery Anderson, 
Robert S. Minturn, Justices Kilbreth and Murray, and other 
leaders of the County Democracy took part. The Syracuse 
Convention had not the ghost of a chance for recognition 
at the National Convention ; for it had not the shadow of 
regularity. It was really the organization of another branch 
of the Democratic party, something like the split of the 
"Hunkers" and ''Barnburners" of earlier times. But by 
its organizers it was doubtless intended as an exhibit to the 
country that Cleveland had a strong party at his back in his 
own State notwithstanding party machinery was against 
him. It was a little singular that the room in the Vander- 
bilt House, at Syracuse, in which this Provisional State 



71S THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Convention held its meeting, was tlie same in wliicli John 
Kelly had met his followers after bolting from the Demo- 
cratic State Convention, in 1879, and perhaps " the scent of 
the rose " hung around it still. The business for which this 
later Kump Convention was called together, the appointment 
of delegates to the J^ational Convention, was of course 
speedily accomplished, and when the Presidential Conven- 
tion assembled at Chicago on June 21, 1892, two sets of 
delegates from New York State were on hand ready to do 
battle for recognition. The regular delegation, headed by 
Edward Murphy, issued a long manifesto showing that 
Hill never had been and could not be defeated in his own 
State, while Cleveland had failed to carry it in 1888, and 
could not again carry it. But, much to the disgust of many 
of those who had taken part in the Anti-Snap movement, 
there was no fight in the Convention. 

Ex- Secretary of the Navy Wm. C. Whitney had appeared 
at Chicago as the advocate and ardent supporter of 
Cleveland, and after scanning the situation, and making " all 
his connections," held a caucus of the Cleveland managers 
at his rooms on the evening preceding the opening of the 
Convention, when it was discovered that Cleveland had 
within seven of a sufficient number of votes to nominate 
him on the first ballot. Thereupon he advised, as did other 
Cleveland managers, that it would be good politics to drop 
the Syracuse or New York bolt altogether ; that it would 
be unwise to evidence serious discord in New York, more 
especially as it was plain Cleveland could be nominated 
without the aid of the 72 votes of this State. Ex-Mayor 
Grace, who had been very active in the Provisional State 
Committee business, thereupon exclaimed : 

" Since we are so early done for, 
I wonder what we were begun for." 

The ex-Mayor had contributed liberally to the advance- 
ment of the " Anti-Snap " movement, as much to satisfy 



WINNING ui:sriTi-: iiis own state. 710 

an old icrudi^o against Governor Hill as to lielp llie Cleve- 
land end of the campaign. When lie reached Cincinnati 
he arrayed himself in a conspicuous coat of war paint, to 
let everybody know he was " spoiling for a fight" — that 
he was in for gore, regardless of cost. After all this 
parade, to be so summarily turned down by (^ommander- 
in-Chief Whitne}', to have all his guns spiked before he 
had even had a chance to say " booh " to the defiant Hill, 
and to see Cleveland achieve a victory without his aid, 
was indeed, to such a man as Grace, " a hard road to 
travel." Bnt such are the inexorable conditions of politics. 
" Circumstances govern cases," and Grace, like another 
'' Borabastes Furioso," had to hang up his fighting boots, 
and charge his share of the expense of the Cleveland bolt 
to profit and loss. Hill was afterwards made TJ. S. Sena- 
tor ; Cleveland somehow did not " hanker after " Grace ; 
and Grace, soured because of Cleveland's lack of apprecia- 
tion as well as because of Hill's advancement, thereafter 
gave politics a wide berth, and found a place in the long 
list of disappointed aspirants. 

But. while Grace and other "anti-snappers" seemed to 
feel badly because they had no chance to get " knocked out" 
of the National Convention as they would have been, on 
the ground of irregularity, as surely as was John Kelly's 
Rump delegation in 1SS4, Hill's friends began to see "the 
handwriting on the wall " and endeavored to make a shift 
toward a combination in favor of U. S. Senator Gorman, 
of Maryland, as a candidate for President. Gorman, how- 
ever, declined to be made a catspaw for the Cleveland 
opposition, and then the bottom of any combination 
against the ex-President's renoraination entirely dropped 
out. "William C. Whitney had proven himself an exceed- 
ingly adroit manager. 

When the National Convention proceeded to make nom- 
inations Cleveland received, on the first ballot, 617 votes ; 



730 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS, 

while 114 votes (including the Y2 from New York State) 
were cast for Hill. Cleveland having obtained more than 
the required two-thirds vote, was of course declared the 
Convention's nominee for President. 

At the Republican Natioual Convention of 1892, James 
G, Blaine and Wm. McKinley (now President) were 
aspirants for the nomination against Benjamin Harrison, 
then occupying the Presidential chair ; but, like Cleveland, 
Harrison was nominated on the first ballot, the vote 
being 535 1-6 for Harrison, 182 1-6 for Blaine, and 182 for 
McKinley. Whitelaw Reid, editor of the New York 
Tribune^ was nominated for Vice-President. The result of 
the election, as I have already stated in this letter, was in 
favor of Cleveland, tariff reform having become the 
popular cry as against high tariff. 

I have examined the files of the Trihune to see if the 
author of the stanzas " Grover Has Got to Go," had cel- 
ebrated the changed conditions by a stanza or two headed 
" Grover's Come Again ; " but, I fail to find anything of 
the kind. Poets are proverbially forgetful. 

The Presidential election of 1896 is too fresh in your 
mind to scarcely need a reference. As you know, it was a 
financial campaign l)etween the advocates of what was 
called " Honest Money " or Gold, and " Sixteen to One " 
or Silver — then regarded as the panacea for all our ills. 
McKinley, the Republican nominee, (who won celebrity 
from the tariff schedule which bore his name, and of which 
he was the originator) won the race against Wm. J. Bryan, 
Democratic nominee, the eloquent and very earnest advo- 
cate of silver. At the present writing, the bountry is again 
beginning to discuss the probabilities of the next Presiden- 
tial campaign, which will characterize the year 1900, when 
I hope to have the pleasure — while extending to you those 
hospitalities which you have so kindly accepted— to discuss 
and explain in person the existing conditions. 



LETTER LYI. 

Origin of the Borough op the Bronx— A Region Always 
Antagonistic to Boss Rule— Unsuccessful Opposition 
OF Kelly and Arthur to Annexation of the West- 
chester Towns— Using Gov. John A. Dix as a Catspaw— 
How the Bosses Avenged Defeat by Holding the Ac- 
quired Territory in Subjugation — Neglect in All 
Things Except Collecting Taxes — Revolt of a Long- 
SuFFERiNG Community — Determined Appeal to the 
State for Relief— A Legislative Investigation Which 
Benefited the People— Triumph of the People's Bill- 
Desperate Effort of the Bosses to Nullify the Ac- 
tion of the Legislature — Governor Hill Approves 
the Act of Emancipation from Misrule. 

My dear Dean : 

Reflecting upon tlie culpable supineness which has charac- 
terized the citizens of New York — excepting an occasional 
spasm of indignation — and which characterizes them to-day, 
while Bosses trample upon their sacred rights and filch 
directly and indirectly millions of their money, it is refresh- 
ing to turn our attention to the bold and independent spirit 
which has always asserted itself in that part of New York 
now embraced within the Borough of the Bronx. The 
history of that territory proves that, in the face of almost 
insurmountable difficulties, the people, '^hen properly 
directed, can swiftly strike off the yoke of Bossism and estab- 
lish the rule of popular authority. Had the citizens of New 
York, south <jf the Harlem river, profited by the example 
set them on more than one occasion, and especially from 
1889 to 1893, by the citizens north of the Harlem river, 
insolent one-man power in New York would have received 
a crushing blow long before this lime. The episodes of 

721 



722 THIKTY YEARS OF NEAV YORK POLItlCS. 

the struggle for civic rights in that growing section of the 
metropolis are at once so interesting and instructive that I 
shall venture a brief description of them. 

Up to 1874 the City of New York was confined within 
the limits of Manhattan Island and a few small islands in 
the East river. Its area was about 14,000 acres and its popu- 
lation in 1874 about 900,000. The City was separated from 
Westchester county by the Harlem river. That portion of 
the county which lay next adjacent to the City consisted 
of three municipalities, known as the towns of Morrisania, 
West Farms and Kingsbridge, whose combined area was 
only twenty-four acres less than that of New York City at 
that time. 

It may be well to add that the Harlem river, now the 
centre of so much activity, was formerly a narrow, marshy, 
unnavigable stream, and up to 1860, obstructed as it was by 
a dam at the terminus of Eighth avenue, (known as Ma- 
comb's Dam), was regarded as more of a nuisance than 
a utility by the public at large, and its filling up, to con- 
nect the city with the mainland, was seriously agitated. 
But, in 1860 or '61, through the manipulations of specu- 
lators in river fronts — with whom Fernando Wood, then 
Mayor, was reported to have secretly co-operated — a very 
expensive iron structure was erected at the terminus of 
Third avenue, and this settled the status of the river. 
Had the other proposition been adopted, a strip of land 
one-third of a mile wide and seven- miles long, with a 
grand trunk sewer running through to convey the stream, 
would have become the property of the city and ten 
millions of dollars already spent in the construction of 
bridges, and the many millions to be expended in addition 
before accommodation is adequate, to say nothing of the 
large expenditures by the Federal Government to convert 
the stream into a ship canal, might have been saved. The 
policy adopted was a most injurious one to the territory 



ORIGIN OF THE BOROUGH OF THE BRONX. rW 

north of the Harlem river and to the Citj itself. Had the 
stream been closed in 18G0, or even at a later period, it is 
impossible to calculate what the ij;rowth of the City north- 
ward might have been. Free from the irritating impedi- 
ments to public travel and traffic, of which the Harlem 
river for two generations has been a standing monument, 
the great City would have advanced in rapid strides 
northerly, and to-day would have absorl^ed within its bosom 
the Yerdant and fertile soil of Westchester as far north as 
White Plains, as far east as the Sound and as far west as 
the Hudson, instead of extending itself southward and 
taking in the marshy swamps and sandy prairies of 
Jamaica and Canarsie and Newtown creek. 

The founding of the village of Morrisania occurred in 
1848, when a tract of 200 acres was purchased from Gouver- 
neur Morris by an association of New Yorkers at less than 
$200 an acre, and the enterprise grew so rapidly that in 
1855 the locality was set off from West Farms as a separate 
town. The locality soon became attractive for residential 
purposes to many denizens of the metropolis. In 1873, 
some shrewd and influential citizens of the towns referred 
to, realizing that New York needed larger territory to meet 
its marvelously rapid increase in population, and that the 
fifty thousand inhabitants of the adjacent towns, former 
New Yorkers, required facilities for public improvements 
not obtainable under circumscribed town governments, be- 
gan an agitation in fav(jr of annexing them to the City. 

Among the foremost of these gentlemen was William 
Cauldwell, who had been Supervisor of Morrisania for six- 
teen consecutive years, chairman of the Board of Super- 
visors of AVestchester county for several terms, had been 
in the State Assembly, and had only just about this time 
completed his four years' service as State Senator from that 
part of the State. He was joined in the movement by others 
who, like himself, were largely interested in the develop- 



724 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

ment of that section, among whom were Lewis G. Morris, 
John J. Crane, Col. Richard M. Hoe, Judge Abram B. 
Tappen, Henry L. Morris, Samuel E. Lyon, Henry P. 
Degraaf, Samuel R. Filley and Hugh N. Camp. The 
territory proposed to be annexed, in point of scenery and 
soil, was perhaps unsurpassed anywhere in the world as a 
suburb of a great City. 

At the outset the annexation movement met with 
many obstructions from those in political control in the 
metropolis. John Kelly was Boss of Tammany Hall, while 
Chester A. Arthur (afterwards President of the United 
States, as related in a previous letter) was Boss of the 
Republican party in this City. Both Bosses were opposed 
to the project. It is an established rule with Bosses, when 
things are running their way politically, to " let well 
enough alone." They have no liking for problems of 
political economy, however beneficial they might be to the 
people, if they are calculated to interfere with the existing 
order of things. 

It is all very well to talk of the benefit which would 
accrue to the City and its inhabitants by some new policy 
or improvement or innovation, but if there is no political 
advantage in it, and, moreover, if there is any danger of its 
being a disturbing element politically, then the Boss, who 
is only Boss for one purpose, has no earthly use for it. In 
other words, the burning question of the hour with every 
Boss is, " Where do I and my followers come in ? " This 
has been so all along through the reigns of Bosses which for 
forty years have cursed New York, checking every public 
improvement, unless there was politics in it, or the profits 
of politics, until Bossism has to-day, as it has for many a 
day and year, Rapid Transit by the throat, having it more 
than half-strangled, despite the fact that two millions of 
people in the Boroughs of Manhattan and Bronx pray for 



RIVAL BOSSES OPPOSE ANNEXATION. 725 

it, and ])lead for it, and beg for it, as one of the first essen- 
tials to their comfort and prosperity. 

And so, not knowing but that it might make some change 
in their political conditions, which were tiieu apparently hos- 
tile, but in reality entirely harmonious, John Kelly and 
(Miester A. Arthur secretly opposed the annexation of the 
territory. But the annexationists were men of determina- 
tion, and by persistent effort a l)ill annexing the three 
towns passed both Houses of the Legislature. After this 
a new difficulty arose. Arthur urged the then Governor, 
John A. Dix, to veto the measure. Dix, after hearing ar- 
gument in its behalf, was greatly impressed in favor of the 
project, and then as a compromise, and to please Arthur, he 
suergested that the bill be amended so as to submit the 
question of annexation to the votes of the citizens of New 
York and Westchester counties. To embarrass the move- 
ment still further the suggested amendment provided that 
all public improvements in the new territory should be 
placed under a different control from the rest of the City, as 
though the district was not yet good enough to be govern- 
mentally associated with the great metropolis. 

Kot being able to do any better, the annexationists had 
to accept the bill in this new form, and it tlius became 
a law. Then the Bosses smiled, believing that it was easy 
for them, in conjunction with the opposition to the measure 
in the upper portion of Westchester county, to defeat an- 
nexation at the polls. 

But there was even still another difficulty which the 
advocates of annexation had to contend against. By some 
oversight, the Act did not make any provision for furnishing 
election machinery to meet the re(piirements of voting on 
the subject of annexation. Extra ballot boxes, ballots and 
other paraphernalia were necessary, and it looked for a 
time as if the matter would go by default. But the 
public-spirited citizens interested in the success of the 



720 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

movement put their hands in their pockets and raised 
funds to meet the emergency. Kelly and Arthur, ^t first 
pretending to doubt the legality of this proceeding, at 
last very reluctantly consented that an equal number of 
pro and con ballots might be sent out to the several election 
districts the night before election. Perhaps this would not 
have been consented to, except that they feared to be pub- 
licly charged with unfairness, nor perhaps even then, had 
they not fully believed that the measure could be easily 
defeated by the popular — or rather by the joint " machine " 
vote controlled by both Bosses. But the movement was so 
manifestly in the best interests of both communities — 
the City and the towns — and such is the force of public 
opinion when properly directed, that notwithstanding 
the power secretly opposing it, the annexation project 
was carried by majorities in each county to the astonish- 
ment and chagrin of both Bosses, 

The new accession to the City was divided into two 
political entities legally designated " the Twenty-third and 
Twenty-fourth Wards of the City of New York," but com- 
prehensively known as " the Annexed District." From the 
start the district was treated after the maner of a conquered 
province. Instead of being brought under the established 
system of the City, as before stated, it was placed under 
the control of the four Commissioners of Public Parks, 
who were unsalaried officials, a sort of " go as you please " 
Commission, which was appointed to look after the beautify- 
ing and improving of Central Park and a few small parks 
scattered here and there throughout the City. Like most 
people who take office for the " honor " or the " fun " of 
the thing, these Commissioners could never regard each 
other seriously. Each following, his private avocation, day 
by day, might be induced once in a while to drive through 
the Park in the Department carriage with the Park Super- 
ijtondent ostentatiously by his side, "to see how things 



WRONGFUL NEGLECT AND MISUULE. 727 

looked," and to roeoive i)ropor ohcisiinct's from the grey- 
coated policemen, who, if they did not know liini, assumed 
tliat he might he one of tlie Commissioners, because he was 
riding witli the .Superintendent, whom they did know, for 
they saw him once in a while. When this "duty" was 
performed, how proud the Commissioner felt that he had 
given the City such valuable ]>ublic service witliout a dol- 
lar's compensation ! 

"With great pomp each of these functionaries would sit 
one day in the week at a public meeting of the Park Board, 
before which assembled a large number of tax-payers, min- 
gled with politicians and place-hunters. It is not difficult 
to understand that each Park Commissioner, thinking that 
he knew more of the subject on hand than the others, felt 
aggrieved whenever any of them disagreed with him. Con- 
flicts of opinion, angry disputes and dissensions, were the 
order of the day. Nor was there any chance of either side 
giving way. There is a possibility of adjustment between 
men who understand what they are talking about, because 
one or the other can be brouglit to see the error of his con- 
tention, but where men are almost wholly ignorant of the 
subject under discussion, there is no great probability of 
agreement, for there is no sound basis on which a surrender 
can be made. Hence after a while every meeting of the 
Park Board was looked forward to as a source of fun for 
the newspapers and the public generally, until at last the 
people, tired of laughing, became disgusted. 

It was under the auspices of this inefficient Board that 
the destinies of the Annexed District were placed in 
1874. For sixteen years did this authority over these 
Wards continue, and it was sixteen years of wrongful 
neglect and shameful misrule. Perhaps the only thing the 
City officials did not neglect was to gather in the taxes. 

The Park Commissioners were a[)pointed ii). such a way 
that some of them went out of office with the installation 



728 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

of every newly-elected Mayor. This kept up a panoramic 
change in the personnel of the Board. When some Park 
Commissioner hegan to know even a little bit of his public 
duties, he was retired and a new man put in his place. 
Whatever plans were adopted for the improvement of the 
23rd and 24th Wards by the outgoing Commissioners dur- 
ing their terms of office, were often unceremoniously set 
aside and other plans substituted by the new Commission- 
ers. But it was with the lines and grades of streets and 
avenues that the Park Commissioners had the greatest 
sport. It was said that there were some Commissioners 
who got more than " sport " out of it. The lines and 
grades of streets and avenues were changed for the special 
benefit of influential and interested property-owners. A 
small holder, unless he were a politician, had nothing what- 
ever to say. Some conscientious Commissioners might lay 
out a street to run from one point to another in a straight 
line, but when new Commissioners came into office, some 
influential property-owner, finding that the proposed street, 
as established on the map, interfered with his house or 
barn, would forthwith induce the Commissioners to alter 
the plan, giving a deflection or curve to the street, so as 
to avoid that great personal calamity. Then when some 
property-owners came to a point where they could not use 
the Park Board for their own purposes, they had a bill 
passed in the Legislature directing that the lines and grades 
of certain streets and avenues be altered in the manner de- 
sired. As many as 150 of such special laws were passed 
from 1874 to 1890, which, together with the alterations by 
the Park Board, made the entire changes number over 300 
within the time stated. A man might go to bed one night 
with a street apparently established in front of his house 
and before he retired to rest the next night the plan would 
be changed, and he might find the street located at the back 
of his house. There being no certainty as to lines and 



APPEALlNt; TO THE STATE KOll RELIEF, WO 

grades tlio inevitable consequence was that coinparativelj 
few buildings were erected and very little improvements 
carried on. 

Nor was this all the evil. Each year the City authori- 
ties made an appropriation for the maintenance and repairs 
of streets and avenues, the expenditure of which was under 
the control of petty ])olitical Bosses. A force of men was 
placed on the Department pay-roll presumably to work, but 
in reality to do little besides drawing pay. Local politicians 
swaggered about town, their pockets filled with appoint- 
ments or '' tickets " signed in blank by the President of 
the Park Board, to be filled and handed out as suited their 
judgment or their personal interest, the holder of each 
'• ticket " being entitled to certain compensation accord- 
ing to his position. It is no slander of these employes 
to say that the work they performed did not tire them. 
They felt like Artemus Ward when lie said that he had 
l)een idling for six months and was not a bit exhausted, and 
that he could start out in the same way for six months 
longer without hurting his health. The ordinary citizen 
looked on at this carnival of idleness and could do nothing, 
while the public highways would disgrace a half -civilized 
community. Before an investigating Committee of the 
State Senate in 1890, in speaking on this subject, I 
described these highways as " elongated mud ponds, punc- 
tuated here and there with turbid pools of stagnant water 
and malodorous filth, the ever fruitful parent of dis- 
ease and death." For years the residents made no loud 
complaint. They acted as if they were proud of enjoying 
the honor, even if it were not a luxury, of being an integral 
part of the Great Metropolis. After being so hospitably 
" taken in/' it would never do to grumble. I do not say 
it to compliment them, but those residents had remarkable 
patience for fourteen long years. On reflection, however, 
I do not believe it was patience. 1 think it was fear. They 



r:]0 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

liad a great local Boss manufactured and equipped by Tam- 
many Hall. 

The district was a sort of an outside farm and the Boss- 
in-Chief named a man of great force of character, who 
cultivated it, after the manner of politicians. As far as 
material improvements were concerned, the local Boss let 
nature take its course, and he saw to it that politics took 
theirs. If any small propei'ty-owner began to make loud 
protests or was what was termed a " kicker," he became a 
marked man, and instead of securing any redress, matters 
■svere made worse for him. So that after a while the small 
holder began to fear that if he did not keep quiet, something 
would happen to him ; that his taxes would be raised, or 
a heavy assessment levied upon his holding, or that perhaps 
he would be driven out altogether. On the other hand, 
the wealthy and influential land-owner, no matter what 
his politics, had it all his own way. Not only were the 
lines and grades of streets and avenues laid out to suit him, 
but the highways running through and near his domain 
were kept as smooth as a billiard-table. In those so-called 
aristocratic sections of the district where residences were a 
quarter of a mile apart, and where the land was taxed practi- 
cally as farm-land, there Avas no mud, nor ruts, nor slush, nor 
pools of stagnant water; but among the settlers of the 
Twenty-third Ward, in Melrose, in East Morrisania, in 
Woodstock, and other parts, where was concentrated the 
bulk of the population, and where one lot paid as much 
taxes as a farm in Ttiverdale or Kingsbridge, the public high- 
ways were not only next to impassable, but were veritable 
pest-holes. 

To illustrate : In the Summer of 1888 I called upon 
a substantial business man and property- owner in Court- 
landt avenue, a thickly-settled portion of tlie district, and 
while conversing with him on business there was a heavy 
fall of rain. We were seated at a window, in the second 



CONDITIONS WHICn CREATED DISCONTENT. r;{l 

st(iry of his lioiise, and had a full view of the avonne for a 
foiisiderahle distance. l>efore the rain fell Courtlandt 
avenue was covered with layers of pulverized mud a foot 
deep. Travel over it l)y horse and truck or other vehicle 
sent clouds of dust into the air so thick and blindinjr as 
to obscure from sight those passing on the opposite side 
of the street. The heavy fall of rain beat down the dust 
and pulverized mud into a solid mass for the time being, 
until the surface of the avenue was covered with a soft, 
greasy-looking material. \"ehicles in passing along, after 
the rain ceased, no longer raised dust, but their wheels sank 
down into the mud and slush to the very hubs, straining 
every muscle of the drafting horses, as the trucks and carts 
tossed now at one side and then at the other, according 
to the location and depth of the innumerable ruts and holes 
which were more or less concealed underneath. But there 
was even worse than this. After the dust and mud became 
consolidated so as to absorb no more water, streams of sur- 
plus rain rushed along the street from a fall in the avenue 
some distance off, and there being no culverts for its escape 
(or if there was an occasional culvert it was certain to be out 
of order) the water made its way into area-ways, into the 
basements and into the cellars of the houses and shops and 
stores along the avenue. It was great fun. The people 
seemed to enjoy it. All interested made frantic efforts to 
divert the tide from their own properties, building up 
temporary dams, while some rushed to the dilapidated cul- 
vert and tugged away at the debris which choked up its 
mouth. During all the scene I saw no man, woman or 
child having an angry face. They took it all as a matter of 
course. They paid their taxes ; they knew that a portion of 
the taxes was appropriated for the repair and maintenance 
of the public streets, and that it went somewhere else ; 
but what of that ? Had they not the honor of being a part 
and parcel of the greatest City on the American Continent ? 



733 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK: POLITICS. 

After watcliing tlie excitement for some time, I said : " Mr. 
Bohmer, do you pay taxes ? " 

"Do I pay taxes ! " he exclaimed. " Well, I should say 
I do, and heavy taxes at that." 

" Then why do you sit idle and make no protest against 
the condition of that street in front of you ? " I asked. 

" What good will that do 'i " he replied. '' I know a man 
in East Morrisania who is hemmed in with mud ; for the 
streets over there are worse than they are here, and he went 
to see the Mayor. The Mayor told him to go to the Street 
Cleaning Department. At the Street Cleaning Depart- 
ment he was told to go to the Health Board. He went to 
the Health Board and was told there that he should go to 
the Department of Public Works. At the Department of 
Public Works he was told to go to the Park Departmentr 
He went to the Park Department and was told to go to the 
Superintendent of Maintenance of Public Streets of the 
23rd and 24th Wards, and when he saw him he was told 
that there was no money left for such work and that he 
would have to go before the Board of Apportionment in 
the Fall when the appropriations were passed upon. 'Now 
to go from one to the other took him six or seven days, 
and he knew as much when he got through as when he 
started." 

As our conversation went on Mr. Bohmer was gradually 
becoming indignant at the ti^eatment the district was receiv- 
ing at the hands of the officials, and he finally invited me 
to attend a meeting of a local Taxpayers' Association a few 
evenings after. At that meeting the subject was discussed . 
earnestly, resulting in a resolution favoring the election or 
appointment of a Commissioner who would have control of 
the public affairs of the district. It was found that there 
were six other Taxpayers' Associations in the Twenty-third 
and Twenty-fourth Wards, and a further resolution was 
adopted to have a Central Body created, consisting of four 



AN INVESTIGATION FraiTFUL OF GOOD. 



733 



delci^ates from the seven Taxpayers' Societies, with power 
to add two to their number, makin<^ in all thirty members. 
The Central Organization was formed under the name 
of ''The Joint Committee of the Taxpayers' Associations 
of the Twenty-third and Twenty -fourth Wards. " The first 
President of the Joint Committee was the late Louis J. 
Ileintz. Tlie Joint Committee was composed of the fol- 
lowing public-spirited citizens: 



Louis J. Ileintz, 
James L. Wells, 
^latthew P. Breen, 
Hugh N". Camp, 
James K. Angel. 
Ferdinand Bohmer. Jr. 
Louis Eickwort, 
B. K. Guion, 
John Cotter, 
W. H. Schott, 



JOINT COMMITTEE. 

John H. Knoeppel, 
Louis A. Risse, 
John Claflin, 
Arthur C. Butts. 
John Eichler, 
W. IL Carpenter, 
A. F. Schwannecke, 
Henry Bracken, 
John Osborn, Jr., 
John N. Emra, 



Richard D. Hamilton, 
Adulph llupfel, 
John Haffen, 
Charles Jones, 
William Ebling, 
William G. McCrea, 
Gustavus A. Robitzek, 
C. H. Woehling, 
John McMahon, 
George Chappell. 



Matthew P. Breen was appointed counsel to the Associa- 
tion, and with him were associated ex- Judge James R. 
Angel and ex-Judge Arthur C. Butts. Counsel prepared a 
bill providing for the ousting of the Park Commissioners 
from control of the public affairs in the Wards, and the 
election of a Commissioner of Street Improvements. The 
Bosses were of course opposed to the project, as had been 
their predecessors to the annexation of the district, and 
the bill, in 1889, failed of passage. But the counsel for the 
Association prepared a resolution which he handed to Sena- 
tor Ives, who represented the district in the higher l)ranch 
of the Legislature, providing for the appointment of a 
Special Committee of Investigation to visit the district and 
examine into the management of its public affairs, and re- 
port to the Senate with such recommendations as may be 
advisable; and, to prevent any objection on tlie ground of 
expense, the resolution added "this investigation to be 



734 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

without expense to tlie State." This resolution was passed. 
Then, shortly after, came along five Senators appointed by 
the presiding officer of the Senate, namely, Commodore P. 
Yedder (chairman), of Cattaraugus county ; George Z, 
Erwin, of St. Lawrence county ; Frank P. Arnold, of 
Otsego county ; Michael C. Murphy and Charles A, 
Stadler, of New York. The Joint Committee contributed 
and raised the necessary funds to pay all the expenses of 
the investigation, which lasted several weeks. The Sena- 
tors, accompanied by a large number of prominent citizens, 
rode in carriages supj^lied by the Joint Committee over the 
district for two days. During the first day a carriage in 
which were Senator Erwin, John H. Knoeppel (now Con- 
course Commissioner), Waldo Hutchins (then President of 
the Park Board), and Albert Gallup, Park Commissioner, 
got stuck in the mud in one of the streets through which 
the procession passed, and the occupants of the carriage had 
to get out and help to extricate the horse and carriage from 
the immense rut into which the wheels had been sunk up 
to the hubs. The public press humorously commented upon 
this incident as an object lesson of considerable value to the 
investigators. The inspection of the territory ended, an 
elaborate luncheon was served at the residence of Louis J. 
Heintz, over which, although a young man, he presided 
with dignity and success. 

After this there was testimony taken for four days, the 
Senate Committee sitting at the celebrated Schnorer Club, 
located in the district, and of which club Mr. Heintz was 
the president. The final hearing was at the Fifth Avenue 
Hotel, at which arguments oral and written were presented 
by Fordham Morris, Hugh N. Camp, James L. Wells, ex- 
Judge James P.. Angel, Louis J. Heintz, John H. Knoep- 
pel, John Claflin, Richard D. Hamilton, Franklin A.Wilcox, 
J. Napoleon Levy, John N. Emra and others. 

As counsel for the Taxpayers it was my duty to sum up 



DETERMINATION TO FIGHT THE BOSSES. T.ir, 

the evidence, and in illustrating the condition of the 
district, among otlier things, I said : 

Now, gentlemen, the evils referred to you have observed in your per- 
sonal examination of that branch of the subject, and I doubt not that 
you were surprised and shocked that a district so generously favored 
l)y nature should have been so palpably neglected by man. Situated 
at the northei-n irate of this great metropolis, and a component part of 
it ; washoil on its eastern boundary by the waters of the Sound, and on 
its western by the Harlem and Hudson rivers, and swept l)3-the health- 
ful breezes of both; possessing every variety of configuration of soil; 
abounding in wood and dale and streandet, and disclosing in a hun- 
dred places scenery and vistas of rare and magic beauty — thus favored 
and blessed, and, so to speak, pampered by nature, our district can be 
transformed by the deft hand of a skilful and diligent administrator of 
its affairs from its present pestiferous condition into one of the healthiest 
and loveliest spots on this continent. 

Then to show the spirit which animated the Taxpayers 
and their firm determination to fight the Bosses to the end, 
I threw down the gauntlet by saying : 

This movement was not started to stop or fall back. This move- 
ment cannot be checked or thwarted by a few ancient political mariners, 
who with stunted comprehension and inverted vision have not yet 
realized that the district has emerged from the bucolic condition of a 
country village, and that it is within the animated and animating 
sti^am and current of a great cosmopolitan city. I say it cannot be 
checked or thwarted, because the discontent of the people, growing 
with the growth of the population and pregnant with complaint, will 
swell into such strength and proportions that all opposition, groat or 
small, sincere or sinister, will be swept aside. I hope and I believe that 
you, gentlemen, will be the authors of this great work. I hope that 
you will be the first to rescue the district, and by your official action to 
lay the foundations of a great new city and that that high distinction 
will not be left to fall to the lot of your successors. 

The result of the investigation was most vahiable to 
the people and was correspondingly injurious to the power 
of the Bosses. In the entire history of New York there is no 
other so striking an example of the triumph of the people 
over compact political machinery and power, as that which 
is to the credit of the citizens of the Twenty-third and 
Twentv-fourth Wards. But while all this was progressing 



736 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

tlie Bosses were laughing in their sleeves. They had abso- 
lute confidence in the omnipotence of machine rule to crush 
the movement, so far as its object was concerned, at the 
proper moment. 

As this battle for civic rights furnishes an object lesson 
to some impracticable reformers of the present day, it may 
be advisable to quote from the Report of the Senate In- 
vestigating Committee. 

After setting forth that the Committee had spent two 
days in personally examining the condition of the district 
with respect to its streets, its sewerage and drainage, and 
had besides taken testimony for several days, the Report 
states : 

All of the witnesses examined are gentlemen not only of high stand- 
ing in the community, but whose present and past experience in the 
public aifairs of the district render their opinions of special importance. 
Among them were Hon. James L. Wells, formerly a representative of 
the district for many years in both the City and State Legislature, and 
whose intimate acquaintance with the government of the district, and 
its maps and public works, adds and gives great weight to his testimony; 
the Hon. John D. Crimmins, for many years President and Treasurer of 
the said Park Department, who has large property interests in these 
Wards and whose testimony as to the workings of the Department relat- 
ing to the district was given in such a forcible and convincing manner 
as to commend itself strongly to our judgment; the Hon. Albert Gallup, 
a present Park Commissioner, who expressed very pronounced opinions 
on the subject of the necessity of a change of authority ; the Hon. John 
B. Haskin, a life-long resident, and an extensive property-owner in the 
district; Mr. Richard D. Hamilton, a gentleman of large and varied 
experience in the public affairs of these Wards ; Mr. John Claflin, the 
well-known New York merchant, a resident and extensive property- 
owner in the district, and also several officers and employes of the 
Park Department. 

The various Taxpayers' and Citizens' Associations of the 23d and 
24th Wards were represented by a Joint Committee whose counsel, the 
Hon. Matthew P. Breen, at the opening of the proceedings, read and 
tiled with your committee a formal complaint which has been made the 
basis of our investigation, which complaint concluded as follows : 

" We declare that we are firmly convinced that under the influence of 
a careful supervision and a skillful administration of the affairs of 



CJIVING HEED TO POPULAR APPEAL. 737 

our public improvements, the value of real estate in these Wards would 
not only specdilj- advance, thus bringing increased wealth to the City 
and increased taxes to its treasury, but the present disgraceful con- 
dition of our highways, and the incomplete and incongruous system of 
drainage and sewerage which retards our progress and imperils our 
health, would cease to exist in a district which is an integral part of the 
metropolis of the country." 

The Senate Committee's Report continues as follows : 
From the testimony submitted, and from our own personal observa- 
tion and examination of the subject, we have unhesitatingly arrived at 
the conclusion that the allegations set forth in the complaint have been 
substantially sustained, and that relief should be granted. 

Without desiring to reflect on the Park Department or its manage- 
ment during an administration of IG years, we are constrained to declare 
that we found nearly CO miles of public highways in a wretched and 
deplorable condition, and in the more thickly populated sections almost 
impassable ; that there are only about 6 miles of paved streets in'au 
area nearly as large as the rest of the city of New York; that there are 
only 27 miles of sewers ; and almost a total absence of drainage in the 
midst of a population of nearly 90,000 people. 

Confronted "with these startling facts, we are of the opinion that 
legislative relief becomes an imperative necessity, and that the relief 
prayed for should be substantially granted. 

The absence of essential improvements is a constant menace to the 
health of this rapidly growing district, fraught with danger to .the lives 
of its residents, and detrimental to the material prosperity of the dis- 
trict. 

This view is fully sustained by the oral and written testimony of 
Hugh X. Camp, ex- Judge Noalf Davis, Albert Gallup, James L. Wells, 
John D. Crimmins, Fordham Morris, Richard D. Hamilton, John B. 
Haskin, John H. Knoeppel, John Claflin, James R. Angel, Louis J. 
Ileintz, John N. Emra, Franklin A. Wilcox, Louis A. Risse, J. Na- 
poleon Levy, B. F. Churchill, Thomas A. Lynch, John Aitken, and the 
petition, properly verified, of about 700 property owners, representing 
in the aggregate a property value as claimed of over $20,000,000 in the 
district, all of which is herewith submitted, and made a part of this 
report. 

That besides the foregoing testimony, we present the following reso- 
lution passed at a meeting of large property-owners of the district, held 
at the Mutual Life Building during the time of our investigation : 

" Resolved, That the interest of the property-owners of the 23d and 
24th Wards would be advanced by placing the affairs of such AVards in 
some department other than the Department of Public Parks. 



T3S THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

"Resolved, That it be recommended to the Semite Committee that 
all powers now exercised by the Department of Public Parks in the 
23d and 24th Wards be transferred to a District Commissioner appointed 
for such Wards." 

The meeting referred to was presided over by Samuel D. Babcock. 
and among those present and participating in the consideration of the 
subject were the following well-known gentlemen : Wm. Smith Brown, 
Isaac G. Johnson, William R. Beal, Lewis G. Morris, Wm. H. Morris, 
ex- Judge A. B. Tappen, Nathaniel P. Bailey, Thomas 11. Faile, Wm. 
Ogden Giles, Hon. Hiram Barney, Dr. John R. Parsons, Schuyler An- 
derson, Capt. Geo. Briggs, Charles Faile, Henry Lewis Morris, ex-Judge 
Ernest Hall, John T. Hunt, John J. Crane. Albert Schwanecke, Emil 
Montgomery and many other prominent citizens. 

The Report, which was signed by all the members of tlie 
Committee, excepting Senator Michael C, Murphy who 
represented one of the Senate districts of this City, was pre- 
sented to the Senate early in the Session of 1890, accom- 
panied with a Bill the passage of which was recommended. 
Now here is where comes in a practical joke on Tammany 
Hall. Hugh J. Grant was then the Tammany Mayor 
of the City, yet the proposed Bill provided for the appoint- 
ment of a Commissioner of Street Improvements on the 
first of May ensuing by the Mayor, As such an officer 
was to be invested with large powers and patronage, this 
apparent generosity on the part of the Republican Commit- 
tee on behalf of a Republican Legislature was very touch- 
ing. The Tammany people who were, up to this time, 
strongly opposed to the proposed change, now began to look 
upon the grievances in the Annexed District in a new 
light. In New York City as well as in the Legislature, 
Tammany politicians openly advocated the proposed change. 
This was exactly the trap that was set for them in introduc- 
ing the Bill in the form referred to, but the Counsel for the 
Taxpayers and Senator Erwin had all along a different pro- 
gramme in view, namely to change it from an appointive to 
an elective office at the proper time, and after the Tam- 
many politicians had committed themselves in favor of 
placing the district under the control of one Commissioner. 



A PRACTICAL JOKE ON TAMMANY. 739 

There was a Coinmittee on Legislation, consistinj^ of 
twelve members of the Joint Committee, which body 
visited the State Capital on several occasions, appeariniz; 
before the Standing Committees of both Honses, and then 
there was a Sub-Committee of five, consisting of Louis J. 
Ileintz, Ferdinand Br)hiner, Jr., John II. Knoeppel, James 
L. Wells and Matthew P. Breen, who were on hand at 
every session of the Legislature during the progress of the 
bill. And all this was done at the sacrifice of time and 
money on the part of each individual member of these 
Committees. 

When the bill came up for its final passage, Senator 
Erwin offered an amendment, which had been prepared for 
some time, providing that the citizens of the Twenty -third 
and Twenty-fourth Wards at the Fall election select by a 
popular vdte the officer who was to have charge of their 
public improvements, and in the course of his remarks 
said : 

" It is always the safest plan to stand close to the people, and I believe 
that the citizens of this long neglected district should be given the right 
to choose their own oflacer, who will conduct their public improve- 
ments and control the expenditure of their moaey. 1 know the district 
is overwhelmingly Democratic, but I am no partisan in a matter where 
the rights of the people are the first consideration." 

This simple but forcible statement, which was really an 
implied challenge to the Democrats, bad the desired effect, 
and the Bill as amended passed both Houses. This was a 
signal victory in face of the fact that the Subuj-ban Club, 
the Republican organization of the 2J:th Ward, and the 
North Side Republican Club of the 23d Ward, both under 
the control of machine Republicans, had passed resolutions 
in opposition to the bill and forwarded them to the Legis- 
lature. 

David B. Hill, a Democrat of Democrats, was Governor. 
Pressure, strong and persistent, was being brought to bear 
upoM hiiu to have him disapprove the bill. The Tamnmiiy 



740 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

leaders realized the danger ahead. Thej knew the people 
were angry with the powers that be, that the demand for a 
change was almost universal, and that the Tammany candi- 
date for this particular office would be badly handicapped. 
Fearing that the pressure upon the Governor would pre- 
vent him from signing the bill, I, as counsel for the 
Taxpayers, started for the City of Troy and paid a visit 
to Edward Murphy, Jr., then Chairman of the Democratic 
State Central Committee. Finding him in his office at his 
brewery, after the necessary explanatory remarks I said : 
" As Chairman of the Democratic State Central Committee, 
I assume it is a part of your duty to look into the condition 
and prospects politically of every Assembly District in the 
State, especially as the next Legislature will have the selecv 
tion of a United States Senator." Having nodded his aps 
proval of this proposition, Mr. Murphy looked at me in- 
quiringly, and I continued: "Now a Republican Legisla- 
ture, on the report of a Republican Special Committee, has 
given this measure of relief in a fight between the humble 
cottager and the wealthy and powerful landowner, and if 
a Democratic Governor shall now defeat a bill of relief 
that is universally and earnestly prayed for, you may be 
certain that our Assembly District (at this time the two 
Wards constituted one Assembly District) will elect a 
Republican Member of Assembly in the Fall." Before 
he could make reply I continued : " Our District is not 
always safe for the Democrats. James L. Wells, a Repub- 
lican, in recent years has been twice elected to the Assem- 
bly, and three times to the Board of Aldermen. Now this 
same Wells is one of the foremost advocates of the 
' People's Bill ' (as the bill was popularly called at the time) 
and if the Governor should now destroy what has been so 
long fought for, on that issue Wells will be easily elected 
to the Assembly in spite of anytliing Tammany can do." 
^' Is Wells a candidate ? " he asked, 



TRIUMPH OF THE PEOrLE'S BILL. m 

" No," I answered, " Imt he will be forced into the field 
under those cireinustanees so as to make sure of a Kepub- 
lican vote for United States Senator." 

" Well," replied Murphy, " my sympathies are on your 
side from what I hav'e heard and now see from the docu- 
ments you show me. I understand tiie matter and will see 
tlie Governor to-morrow morning." So he did ; for 1 met 
him next day and he informed me that it was his jud<i|;ment 
that the bill would be signed. The Governor, however, 
was so pressed on the other side with arguments, misrepre- 
sentations, falsehoods and slanders, that he came to New 
York the next Saturday and, hiring a carriage, was driven 
over the district to see the condition of the streets with his 
own eyes. When he returned he said that, so far from 
exaggerating, the taxpayers' statements did not fully de- 
scribe the atrocious condition of the district. He signed 
the bill. 

Now the sequel. 

In November the district elected a Democratic Assem- 
blyman. 

The following January, on a joint ballot of both branches 
of the Legislature, David B, Hill was elected United States 
Senator. He could not have been elected without the 
vote of this Democratic Member of Assembly, and this 
Democratic vote would not have been recorded had Gov- 
ernor Hill killed " The People's Bill." 



LETTER LYII. 

The Exciting Contest Following the Passage of the 
People's Bill — Tammany's Boss Confident of Winning 
the Prize at the Polls — Organization of the Citizens' 
Local Improvement Party— Purroy Startled by the 
Nomination of Louis J. Heintz— A Campaign of Abuse 
AND Vilification — Tammany's Caricature and the Peo- 
ple's Lampoon — Champion of anti-Bossism Triumphantly 
Elected — Cunning Attempt to Lure him into the Wig- 
wam — Programme to Legislate him Out of Office^ 
Boss McLaughlin Foils the Scheme — But the Successful 
Champion of Popular Rights does not Long Survive 
his Victory. 

My dear Dean : 

The announcement that Governor David B. Hill had 
affixed his approving signature to " The People's Bill," as 
stated in the last letter, took the machine politicians of 
both parties in the City by surprise, while it was hailed 
with joy by every independent citizen of the City north of 
the Harlem River, and by many south of it, who had been 
watching the struggle between the people and the politic- 
ians. It was a victory of great significance because it was 
in the nature of a double triumph, defeating the efforts of 
the Republican as well as the Democratic local machines. 

Ton may ask why should the machine Republicans of the 
district oppose the change of authority? The answer is 
that they had their representative in the Park Board in 
the person of Commissioner Borden, a Republican ; that 
many Republicans were then enjoying positions in the 
Department, and they feared any change which might 
jeopardize this advantage. Besides, hke all machine politic- 
ians, they looked upon an organization of independent 

742 



PREPARING FOR FIGHT AT THE POLLS. ti^ 

citizens as an iini)ertinent interference in matters wliicli 
they alone should control. And tlien again such a move- 
ment as the one in <|uostion had absorbed the independent 
and intelligent members of both parties, and thereby tended 
to disintegrate the " machines." This accounts for the 
resolutions forwarded to the Legislature by each of the 
Republican organizations of the 23rd and 2-ith Wards 
against the passage of '' The People's Bill." 

But the greatest battle was still to take place. The Joint 
Committee of the several Taxpayers' Associations gravely 
realized the importance of the election in the Fall for the 
new Commissioner. They felt that to permit Tammany Hall 
to capture the olhce would be to continue, under a new 
head, the same conditions which since 1874 had cursed the 
district. The machine RepuV)licans, unable to control more 
than one-third of the voters of the district, could not expect 
to win anything, and they simply stood around, as has been 
tlieir custom in New York from time immemorial, waiting 
for what might drop from the Democratic table. Although 
yet four months from election, the Joint Committee com- 
menced to lay the foundations of their canvass. An ad- 
dress was issued by that body to the voters in the district, 
congratulating them on their victory and recommending 
that they see to it that no one but an independent and 
competent man should be elected as the new Connnissioner. 

Henry D. Purroy was the district leader of Tammany 
Hall. He was a man of large experience in political man- 
agement. He had held the crank of the " machine " almost 
from boyhood, and he had worked it vigorously, often des- 
perately. He held then a powerful ofhce, President of the 
Fire Department, in which position he had justly earned 
distinction as a progressive official and strict disciplinarian. 
Besides, his character for personal integrity was above re- 
proach. Purroy was more than a mere district leader. The 
Wards were divided politically into two districts, Jacob Sea- 



744 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICO. 

bold being the Tammany leader in the Twenty- third Ward 
and John B. Shea in the Twenty-fourth Ward. But in real ity 
Purroy was the absolute leader in both Wards, and Seabold 
and Shea were there merely to register his will and do the 
details of his work. Besides all this, Purroy was high in 
the councils of Boss Croker at that time, and all aid was 
to be rendered to him in the approaching battle north of 
the Harlem River. Tammany was in high feather. Hugh 
J. Grant was Mayor, and all the public offices in New York 
were in the hands of the faithful. 

It was ujjhill work to face Purroy's organization under 
such circumstances. It was known that he was laughing 
at the Citizens' and Taxpayers' pretensions. But, nothing 
daunted, the Joint Committee sent a second document in 
the month of September to everj voter in the two Wards, 
now boldly assailing Tammany and calling upon the people 
to organize for their own protection. Purroy still laughed 
at their proceedings. Six weeks before election the Joint 
Committee organized " The Citizens' Local Improvement 
Party." John H. Knoeppel was chosen chairman. Knoep- 
pel was a wise selection. A Republican in politics, yet he 
was known throughout the district to bo absolutely inde- 
pendent in local affairs. He was one of the foremost in 
the fight to rescue the territory from machine control. A 
prominent merchant of the City, and a large property- 
owner of the district, he was properly regarded without 
political ambition although devoting much time and energy 
to the cause of good government. A forceful and logical 
public speaker, he gave tone and strength to the organiza- 
tion over which he presided. The new organization estab- 
lished local branches or clubs in every election district. It 
formed a general committee, an executive committee and 
a finance committee. Among its membership were the 
best men of the district, rich and poor. 

John H. J. Ronner, formerly the Tammany leader of the 



CHAMPION OF PEOPLE'S PARTY NOMINATED. Tlo 

district (in the days wheu Purroy was disporting liiiiiself 
as one of the leaders of the County Democracy), now re- 
signed from that organization, joined the Citizens' party 
and was made chairman of the finance committee. Be- 
inij^ a man of strength and character, his accession to the 
ranks of the Citizens' party was hailed as a good omen, and 
so it was, for several others in a few days followed his ex- 
ample. 

One day, through the manipulation principally of Ronner, 
a largo number resigned from Tammany in a batch, and this 
circumstance was given proper notice in the public press. 
Purroy had now at last stopped laughing and got into the 
first stages of fright. But one evening, four vv-eeks before 
the day of election, he received not only a fright, but a shock, 
when the Citizens' Local Improvement party held a Con- 
vention in the biggest hall in the district and, with great 
formality and due deliberation, nominated Louis J. Heintz 
for Commissioner of Street Improvements of the Twenty- 
third and Twenty-fourth Wards. His nomination looked 
as if it had been an inspiration, for perhaps no other man 
could have won against Purroy's candidate. 

Louis J. Heintz was an unusually attractive person. He 
possessed almost every element of popularity. At the time 
of his nomination he was scarcely twenty-nine years of age. 
The nephew of a wealthy brewer, John Eichler, he received 
a liberal education, but at an early age entered actively into 
the business of his uncle, until he rose to be almost its abso- 
lute manager. As an indication of his business capacity he 
was about this time elected President of the Brewers' Ex- 
change for the Metropolitan District of New York, com- 
]irising New York City, Jersey City, Brooklyn and other 
surrounding localities. Of extremely comely appearance, 
agreeable manners and off-hand liberality, he was made 
welcome in every society he entered. Moreover, he was in- 
telligent in public affairs, somewhat skilled in political 



746 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

machinery and public-spirited almost to a fault. But, above 
all, be was courageous and never turned bis back in a fight. 
Through all the doubts and fears and disappointments 
which beset our work for two years, in Albany, in the fight 
to pass " The People's Bill," he remained steady, unbending 
and determined. As chairman of the Joint Committee he 
was liberal in entertaining everywhere he went, more 
especially at Albany, and he could get the ear of a " doubt- 
ing statesman " quicker than any man I ever knew. To 
add to his highest laurels, he was an inflexible foe of 
ofiicial peculation. 

This was the young man who, nominated by the independ- 
ent citizens, and with an endorsement by the anti-Tammany 
element of the district, faced Tammany Hall and all its 
cohorts in the memorable campaign of 1890. The entire 
City watched the conflict. Although there was a contest 
for Mayor of the City going on at the same time, the news- 
papers devoted the larger space in their columns to the 
battle " beyond the Harlem " — all because it was a fight be- 
tween the People and the Bosses. The contest, from the 
start bitter enough, became on the part of the Tammany 
leaders scurrilous towards the end. Finding that Heintz, 
off and on the platform, was cutting the ground from under 
them, Purroy and his followers grew desperate. It was 
plain that Tammany was going to sweep the City from end to 
end, everywhere except in the " Annexed District." It was 
essential to Purroy's standing in Tammany Hall, where he 
had a large number of open, and a still larger number of 
secret, enemies, that he should win, and his loss of prestige, 
by defeat, in a district which he claimed to have in his 
pocket, would endanger his very existence politically in that 
organization. So he and his followers, feeling themselves 
on the verge of destruction, had recourse, as a last refuge, 
to abuse and vilification. 

In the midst of all the vile work of slander, some humor- 



CAMPAIGN OF AIJUSE AND VILIFICATION. 747 

ous })liases of the campaign occasionally loosened the tension. 
I have said that Heintz was the nephew of a brewer, and 
that he had charge of his uncle's business. Purroy's candi- 
date was Louis F. IlaCfeu, the son of a brewer, but who was 
an engineer by profession, and at the tinio of his nomina- 
tion b}' Tammany Hall was an assistant engineer in tlie 
Park Department, against whose control of the district the 
people had become so much aroused. If anything more 
than another could prove Purroy's desperation, it was the 
nomination of Ilaiien. For years he had been hostile to 
the Ilalfen family, and the feeling, on their part, was 
heartily reciprocated. The primary cause of Purroy's anti- 
pathy was that some years before he had nominated and 
elected Henry Haffen (a brother of Louis F. Haffen) Alder- 
man, and that liaSen with three other Tammany Aldermen 
betrayed him and the organization which elected him, by 
voting to oust John Kelly from the ComptroUership, the 
circumstances relating to which I have given in a previous 
letter. To make the matter worse, there seemed to be no 
explanation of this treachery on the part of these four 
.Tammany men in voting' to elect to the office of Comp- 
troller an enemy of their organization in the person of Allan 
Campbell, exce])t the one explanation, publicly charged 
against them, which reflected on their integrity. So that 
when Purroy nominated the brother of this man for this 
important office, the people were wondering if he had not 
taken leave of his senses. But the nomination of Ilafien 
did credit to Purroy's sagacity. It was aimed to divide the 
Cferman vote by placing one representative German against 
the other, and also the brewery vote by putting up the son 
of a brewer against the nephew of a brewer. Perhaps 
another explanation of Purroy's apparently forgiving 
s])irit may be found in one of the humors of the cam- 
paign. Large posters were hung up in public places, and 
pasted on fences and dead walls, displaying a figure of one 



7*8 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

man with liis coat off (Haffen) engaged iu drawing maps, 
and a figure of another man (Heintz) with a white apron, 
his coat off, his shirt sleeves rolled up, drawing beer from 
a keg, while underneath was printed : 

FUNNY, ISN'T IT? 

THE ONE DRAWS MAPS, AND THE OTHER DRAWS BEER. 

This was the strong point of the Tammany campaign, 
namely, to show that Haffen, being a civil engineer, had 
qualifications to carry on public improvements, and that 
Heintz had none. 

While the Citizens' party managers steadily refused to 
imitate Tammany in scurrility, they were not behind in 
responding to the above pleasantry, and a few days after it 
appeared, 20,000 copies of the following lampoon were 
distributed and read with such avidity and merriment by 
the public that the Purroy caricature, its contents and sub- 
ject were forgotten : 

LOOKING FOR A BIG JOB. 



A Thrilling Drama in One Act. 



Characters — Henry D. Purroy, Louis F. Haffen and Jack Shea. 

(The dialogue is a correct transcript of the notes of a stenographer 
secreted in the room.) 

Purroy (sitting in state at Fire Department Headquarters. Enter 
Haffen, timidly, with hat in hand.) — " "Well, sir, what do you want ? " 

Haffen — "I came to — well, to ask your nomination for the new Com- 
misy'oner." 

Purroy — " What is your name ?" 

Haffen — "Louis F. Haffen, sir." 

Purroy — ' ' Are you related to Henry Haflfen, who was once my Alder- 
man ? " 

Haflfen — "I am his brother, sir; but I'm not like him; I'll stick to 
you." 



TKlJ.INr. IJEl'LY TO A TAMMANV CARICATURE. T4{> 

Purroy — "Arc you cumpclent for this oflict!? Are you a man of 
push and energy? " 

llaffeu — "Yes, sir." 

Purroy — " How can you prove that?" 

llaffeu—" Well, soiuc years ago, I got $5,000 from my father to start 
iu life with. I weut out West, and lost it all very (quickly." 

Purroy — '• That doesn't prove that you have j)ush and energy." 

llalTen — " I walked all the way back." 

Purroy— • ' Oh! 1 see. Then you didn't get along out West? " 

llalTen— " Xo. The people didn't seem to appreciate me. They don't 
know a good thing when they see it out there." 

Purroy — " Are you a man fresh from the people? " 

Haffen— " I'm from the Park Department, and you can see that I am 
fresh." 

Purroy —" How long have you been in the Park Department?" 

llaffeu — " Seven years." 

Purroy— ' ' What salary have you had ? " 

Haffen-" Most of the time, $1,200 a year," 

Purroy—" Why didn't you get more? " 

Haffen — " They wouldn't give me any more." 

Purroy — "Then they also don't know a good thing when they see it." 

Haffen — "That's it, exactly." 

Purroy — " You don't expect to have a mind of your own in this busi- 
ness, do you?" 

Haffen — " Certainly not." 

Purroy — " Do you know Jack Shea? " 

Haffen — " Yes, sir." 

Purroy — ''Jack would make a good Deputy Commissioner." 

Haffen — " Fine." 

Purroy— "You will need Jack to look out for the patronage. You 
will be bothered for places by a lot of fellows who are no good to us. 
You don't know the men who do our work; but Jack does, and can 
place them where they belong. The Citizen's party call my followers 
the " Gang," but you never mind; they are all good fellows. You can 
do the surveying and let Jack do the other business." 

Haffen-" I always liked, and I heard big Tommy Hughes say that 
Jack had a great big mind. " 

Purroy—" That will do, Mr. Haffen. I'll see Jack." 

[Exit Haffen and enter Jack Shea.] 
Purroy— "The plan worked like a charm, .Tack. He is crazy to run, 

and if by any chance he should win, we can handle him like a baby." 
Shea— '■ How can he be elected when I couldn't? I'm a thousand 

votes stronger than he is, and I wouldn't run. Tammany hasn't over 



750 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

5,000 votes in the District at the best. The total vote will be 13,000, 
and 5,000 can't beat 8,000. Then look at all the desertions from our 
ranks. We can't poll 4,000 votes." 

Purroy — " Well, I tried to get Moebus, Zeltner or Wilkins to run so 
as to divide the Dutch vote, but they declined. Let Ilaffen take it. 
His folks will put out money, and if anybody is to be beaten it would 
suit me better that he should be a Haffen than anybody else. Send 
HaflEen to me again." 

[Exit Shea, and enter Ilaffen, looking anxious.] 
Purroy — " Can you hold y6ur own in a debate with the members of 
the Board of Street Opening and the Board of Apportionment ? " 

Haffen — "Well, sir, if you nominate me I will paralyze you with the 
speech I will make at the Convention. " 

(Purroy heard the speech and was paralyzed. So was the Con- 
vention.) 

The result of the campaign was the election of Heintz for 
a ±erm of six years. When he entered upon the duties of his 
office on the first of January, 1891, he was confronted with 
the difficult task of organizing a new department, but being 
a tliorough business man, he soon had everything running 
smoothly and satisfactorily. For two years I had been 
closely associated with him and I know the high purposes 
he had in view relating to the pubHc improvements affect- 
ing the territory north of the Harlem River. For the pro- 
fessional services which it was my lot to render in that great 
movement — great because it points out how poHtical Bosses 
may be defeated — Heintz started, without my knowledge, 
to quietly solicit subscriptions for the purpose of raising 
$5,000 to remunerate me ; but, having found out his inten- 
tions, I peremptorily declined the proposed benefit. A 
couple of months after this a delegation waited upon me at 
my residence and presented me with a testimonial beauti- 
fully engrossed and framed. I value it nmch more than 
$5,000, Trusting that it may be regarded as a j^ardonable 
pride for me to refer to it, I give its text as follows : 

At a meeting f the Joint Committee of the several Taxpayers Associ- 
ations of the 23d and 24th Wards of the City of New York, held at 



GRAND SUCCESS OF THE PEOl'LE'S MOVEMENT. 7.)1 

Headquarters, 103(1 street, nesir Third avenue, ou Friday evening, De- 
cember 1-2. 1890. the following resolutions were unanimously adopted : 

Besolml, that the thanks of this committee be and the same are hereby 
most heartily tendered to the lion. Matthew P. Breen, the attorney 
and counsel of the Joint Committee of the several Taxpayers Associa- 
tions of the 23d and 24th Wards for the exceedingly laborious and 
efficient services gratuitously rendered by him during the last two years 
on behalf of "The People's Bill " creating the olflce of Commissioner of 
Street Improvements of the 23d and 24th AVards. in intelligently pre- 
senting the complaints and grievances of our residents and skillfully 
conducting the examination of the same before the Special Committee 
of the State Senate charged with the investigation of our local affairs, 
in the thoughtful preparation of the necessary legal measures for 
introduction in both branches of the State Legislature, and in ably 
advocating the same before the Standing Committees of that body and 
before the Governor. 

Resolved, that we cheerfully record the fact that the successful enact- 
ment of "The People's Bill," a measure so essential to the progress and 
welfare of this portion of our city, is largely due to the undaunted 
courage, zealous perseverance, skillful mtmagement and patriotic 
motives of lion. Matthew P. Breen, and that his course in the matter is 
worthy of the highest commendation. 

Renoleed, that these resolutions be suitably engrossed and presented 

to ]\lr. Breen, and that a copy of the same be furnished to the press of 

the city. 

Louis J. Heiktz, Chaimian. 

James L. AVeli^s, Treasurer. 

John Osborne Jr., Secretary. 

Tammany, although trimnphant throughout the City, was 
stopped in its onward march when it reached beyond the 
Harlem. What did it? Intelligent agitation and the 
courage of the independent voter. 

But Tammany did not intend that a Democrat such as 
Ileintz was— he having been, up to the time of his nomina- 
tion by the Citizens, a member of Tammany Hall, — should 
remain outside of its fold for six long years with all the 
power and patronage of his Department. Accordingly 
a movement was started by the Tammany braves to 
capture Heintz and lead him into their own tepee. As ? 
bait they were willing to make him a Tammany leader. 



75;s THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

This was sucli an extraordinary honor in their eyes that it 
was assumed as a matter of course that he would readily 
accept it. A certain busybody, whom we shall call Straddle- 
back, was carrying on the negotiations and acted as a go- 
between. Straddleback did not reside in the district, but 
pretended at the Tammany Headquarters that he could 
influence Heintz, and as it would greatly add to his own 
importance if he brought the new Commissioner into 
Tammany Hall, he bent every energy in that direction. 

Under the provisions of the new reapportionment there 
was to be a division of the territory into two Assembly 
Districts. Mayor Thomas F. Gilroy was chairman of the 
Tammany Hall Committee charged with the duty of mak- 
ing the new divisions. 

As a further inducement to Heintz, the Tammany Com- 
mittee cut out a district for him so that all the breweries 
in the district but one and the principal lager beer and 
drinking saloons were corralled within it, leaving Purroy a 
scattered and zig-zag district, which was four miles long at 
some points and running all the way from less than a quar- 
ter of a mile to a mile and a half in width. The division 
was wholly unsymmetrical and transparently unjust. Pur- 
roy protested, but after his defeat who would care to listen 
to him ? Straddleback had assured the Tammany people 
that Heintz would of course be glad to accept and every- 
thing was arranged accordingly. 

Then, when it was all done, after the district was politi- 
cally mutilated, after Purroy had been grossly insulted, 
just think, Heintz peremptorily declined to be captured. 
Not only this, but he gave no patronage to Tammany 
Hall, but, like the man that he was, ignored it and 
gave the patronage to the anti-Tammany organizations 
that supported him in his election. Then Croker got 
angry and threatened. Heintz defied his threats, and told 
the pretentious busybody, Straddleback, who conveyed the 



TAMMANY'S ATTEMPT TO CAPTURE THE VICTOK. 753 

tlircat, that he was not afraid of Croker. Tlieii, in llie 
i-ession of tlie Leiifislature of 1892, a bill was prej)arod to 
Iciijislatc llc'iiitz out of office and putting all the pulilic 
iinprovenients of the Annexed District under the ('oni- 
inissioner of Public Works It was all settled that the bill 
was to be introduced in a few days and rushed through. 
Having satisfied myself that the bill was in readiness 
for the coming week, I called on Ex Senator Ecclesine, 
who was well-acquainted with Boss McLaughlin, of Brook- 
lyn, and knowing that such a bill could not pass without 
the aid of the Brooklyn delegation in the Legislature, 
I asked Ecclesine to lay the matter before McLaughlin, 
who would not be likely to sanction such injustice. 
Next day, he and I went to Brooklyn. He went to see 
McLaughlin, in Wil lough by street, while I waited at the 
Clarendon Hotel, near at hand, for his return. When 
he had seated himself, after his visit to McLaughlin, 
Ecclesine said : " What a difference there is between the 
two Bosses, on either side of the East river; the one 
laughs at principle in politics, the other seems to be guided 
altogether by it. McLaughlin did not need much explana- 
tion about Heintz's fight north of the Harlem, as he said he 
knew a good deal about it from what he had read and heard, 
l)ut he was astonished to hear that any attempt was going 
to be made to legislate him out of an office the people had 
elected him to. Now," said the Senator, " I will give Mc- 
Laughlin's exact words as 1 remember them : ' It's a mean 
way to get square with a man who beats you at the polls. 
The manly way is to wait and beat him back. I am against 
legislating out of office any man who has been elected by 
the people, and when our folks come from Albany I will 
tell them so.' And," said the Senator, "' I'll bet you a bottle 
of wine you will not hear of the anti-lleintz bill again." 

Next week I was in Albany, and running across a Brook- 
lyn Senator who was close to McLaughlin, he desired me 



'354 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

to say confidentially to Heintz that there was a movement 
on foot to legislate him out of office, but that he was going 
to stop it. He did not know of my friend's visit to Mc- 
Laughlin, and I did not tell him. 

Nothing further was heard about the bill, and Heintz re- 
mained unshaken in his independent and defiant attitude. 
After administering the office for a little more than two 
years, Heintz, while attending President Cleveland's second 
inauguration, contracted a cold, which terminated in his 
death in March, 1893. 

The death of Louis J. Heintz was mourned as though a 
personal calamity had befallen every household in the 
district. His administration had brought order out of 
chaos. It established on a firm basis a system of conduct- 
ing public improvements at once economical and efficient. 
The new order of things was worth untold millions to the 
district. 

Thus had the public affairs of those Wards been con- 
ducted by him and his successor for seven years, ull/til the 
system was ruthlessly abolished by the Greater New York 
Commissioners who established what is called the Borough 
System of Government, but which in reality deprives the 
people of the Borough of almost every vestige of local 
government and local responsibility, and under which the 
district has relapsed, as far as it can, into the old rut of 
conducting public business. 

What are they going to do about it ? 




lilClIAKI) CkoKEK. 



LETTER LVIII. 

How Richard Croker Became Boss— A Man of Nerve and 
Cunning — Herculean Efforts of a Few Brainy Men to 
Upbuild Tammany's Shattered Fortunes After Kelly's 
Death — Croker Steals the Credit — Saturnalia of 
County Democracy Leaders — The Irish Flag Antics of 
Mayor Hewitt — Tammany's Victory — Croker Controls 
the New Mayor, Assumes Command and Clips the Wings 
OF Rivals — An Expert Witness Before Investigating 
Committees — Perhaps the Highest Living Al'Thority as 
TO What is "Private Business" — Croker's Surprising 
Spring from Indigence to Affluence — Now Declares 
His Intention to Run Judges as Well as Race Horses — 
His "Greatest Political Show on Earth" — But He 
Only Promotes "Old Wheel Horses," Keeps Out Royal 
Bengal Tigers, Controls the Box Office, Pockets the 
Gate Money, and " It's Dead Easy for Him to Keep on 
Top in the Game "—But There's Trouble Ahead. 

My dear Dean : 

It is not an easy task to write with calmness and discre- 
tion concerning political conditions whose irritating influ- 
ences surround the writer even while he is engaged in 
describing and reviewing them. Still more difficult is it to 
faithfully and impartially portray the political personage 
who directly and immediately represents such conditions 
and who at the time of such writing is exercising a 
despotic political ascendancy at variance with the spirit of 
our institutions and inconsistent with the independence of 
American citizenship. 

After all I have. shown of the past, after all we have 
seen of the one-man power in politics and the wrongs and 
Infamies which such power engendered and fostered, it is 



756 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

now difficult to write of sliameful subserviency to the 
methods and dictation of a political autocrat, without a 
sense of humiliation and a sting of impatience. Never- 
theless, in these letters Richard Croker will have fair play. 
Whatever there is of good in him or of him, as well as what 
there is objectionable in his political character and con- 
duct, will, so far as the writer is able, be correctly and 
fairly recorded. Indeed, I am free to admit that, no mat- 
ter how culpable Croker may be, his culpability is not 
nearly so great as that of the hundreds of thousands of 
citizens who, having the power to check and obliterate his 
rule, complacently submit to it. His assumed political 
dictatorsliip might be regarded as a farce, if it were not so 
scathing a disgrace to the community which tolerates it, 
curses it, and laughs at it. 

In dealing with Croker, of course the most important 
consideration is that which relates to his present exalted 
and almost unlimited power, as the political Boss of our 
City. It is with his overshadowing influence in the body 
politic that we have to deal, rather than with what his 
earlier career had been, when he was of small consequence 
in the community. Of little moment is it to us now, 
whether his early life was good or bad — whether he was a 
person of scant education and inferior surroundings, or 
whether he was brought up under the influences of moral 
teachings and good examples ; whether he had fought a 
prize-fight on Sunday morning, or had been a pious and 
meek Superintendent of a Sunday school. Many men who 
have been brought up amidst surroundings similar to those 
from which Croker emerged, became afterwards strong 
in moral proportions and ended their careers respected and 
honored by the community in which they lived. 

If, therefore, in order to complete the history of a man 
who exercises potential sway over the public affairs of the 
second City of the world, I am obliged to travel back to his 



CKOKER A MUCH INVESTIGATED MAN. 757 

early career, it is not because it is an ai;'reeal)le task. T take 
no c]eli<j:lit in dwelling on this part of liis life; and if I 
must discuss it, I shall approach the subject, to enii)l()y a 
tigure of Lord Macaulay, with the feelings of a surgeon 
about to perform a severe operation wliicli he knows to be 
necessary. 

Croker is at present in your country (England). On 
the occasion of his recent departure from these shores, the 
Tammany office-holders, bearing flowers and garlands, as- 
sembled in large numbers on the pier from which their 
chieftain embarked, cheering lustily and waving their 
adieus with unusual fervor. But there were others — a 
large number of Democratic politicians of the city, many 
of them in Tammany Ilall — who would have gladly joined 
in the demonstration and waved their adieus with even 
still greater fervor, were they convinced that he would 
never return, 

Croker has so often left these shores for Europe that 
his departures are not of late attended with any unusual 
ceremony, and the demonstration above referred to was for 
the purpose of emphasizing his alleged triumph before the 
]\razet Investigating Committee. This committee consists 
of five members of the lower branch of the State Legis- 
lature which had been appointed by resolution of the State 
Assembly with instructions to examine and report into the 
conduct and management of the various Departments of the 
City, and other matters in connection therewith. 

Croker was summoned before this Committee and ex- 
amined, lie is now an expert witness in this line, as he 
had been before the Fassett Committee in 1890, and before 
tlie Lexow Committee in 1891, and now for a third time 
before the Mazet Committee. Croker's examination by 
the Fassett Committee in 1890 disclosed the fact that, 
although only a short time before in straitened financial 
circumstances, he was then in the enjoyment of considerable 



75S THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

wealth. This sudden jump from indigence to affluence 
aroused the curiosity of the Committee, and Fassett, who 
was an up-countrj statesman, made laudable efforts to un- 
ravel the mystery. It was shown clearly that Croker sud- 
denly burst forth into wealth, like another Monte Cristo ; 
that he had no business, not even " private business ; " it 
was certain he had no mint of his own, and how on 
earth he " got it " was a puzzle to the bucolic innocence of 
Fassett and his Committee. Of course they had a sus- 
picion. They even traced a little portion of his wealth. 
Croker had a brother-in law, named McCann, or, to be 
strictly correct, Croker and McCann were married to two 
sisters. Possibly partly through spite and partly through 
envy that Croker was getting so rich without a correspond- 
ing rise in his own financial condition, which at the time 
was very low — for why should not one brother-in-law be as 
good as another ? — McCann went before the Fassett Com- 
mittee and gave his relative " dead away." He stated that 
Hugh J. Grant, whom Croker made Sheriff, had given 
Croker a large amount of money, presumably part of the 
Sheriff's perquisites, and made many damaging statements 
in connection therewith. Grant went on the stand and 
said it was only a trilling matter of $10,000 which he 
gave to Croker's little daughter, for whom he stated he was 
godfather, and that there was no harm whatever in it. 

Croker's examination by the Lexow Committee, in De- 
cember, 1894:, was a very tame affair. It was after elec- 
tion; Tammany was beaten, and Croker declared that he 
was "out of politics," and possibly the Committee said, 
" What's the use ? " 

But if Croker was wealthy before, it was as nothing to 
the wealth he sprang to afterwards. His last examination by 
the Mazet Committee, in May, 1899, was perhaps the most 
serious. Piatt, the great Republican Boss who ruled the 
Legislature, and who of course had adequate influence with 



SIGNIFICANT ADMISSION BEFORE MAZET COMMITTEE. 759 

rbe Mazet Committee, was no longer an admirer of (Jrokcr, 
and the Committee began to probe into Croker's affairs 
in earnest. Crokcr answered wlien the questions suited 
him, and declined to answer wlicn they did not suit liim. 
He was asked if he was not worth millions, and scornfully 
refused to answer. He was asked about various transac- 
tions, and he answered : " That is my private business." 
This answer was given over and over again, with great suc- 
cess, apparently. Other ]n-omincnt Tammany men were 
subsequently examiried, and they followed the same course, 
jileading the " private business " doctrine laid down by their 
chief. So that Croker may now be regarded as the highest 
living authority on what is " private business." 

But by far the most significant admission made by him 
on the witness-stand was an admission to the effect that he 
nominated Judges with the expectation that they would 
extend favors to him and his organization, and that he had 
refused a renomi nation to Judge Joseph F. Daly because 
that Judge had declined to comply with Croker's orders 
in the exercise of certain of his judicial functions. Serenely 
unconscious of the degrading light in which he was pic- 
turing every Judge receiving or expecting a Tammany 
noinination, Croker gave this testimony with the air of 
a man who was proud of his authority, and threw out the 
undisguised intimation that aspirants for Judgeships here- 
after should draw a solemn warning from the fate of Judge 
Daly. Had Croker been speaking of some directions 
given to one of his trainers or jockeys on the race-track, he 
could not have had more of a matter-of-course air about him 
than when intimating that Supreme Court Judges were ex- 
pected to take orders from him. 

But, as more will be said on this subject in a subsequent 
letter, it may be best to explain — what, doubtless, you 
are anxious to know — how Croker has acquired and ex- 
ercised for years, and still exercises at the time of this 



760 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

writing, almost des2:)otic political sway in a great city 
like New York. It is an interesting problem, yet it need 
not be a very perplexing one in the light of what you 
already know concerning Bossism and the " machine." 

Croker has reigned as Tammany's Boss, absolute and 
unquestioned, since 1886, a period of twelve years, and his 
method of holding himself in power in spite of his record 
of running away twice (1894 and 1896) from the field of 
battle, when he saw a cloud of danger hanging over the 
Tammany forces, and in spite also of the ambition of many 
able and educated Democrats in New York to depose him, 
is worthy of discussion. But, first, it may be advisable 
to relate the chapter of accidents whereby he was able to 
acquire such power. Although Croker may be said to be, 
to use an expression of Lord Thurlow, " an accident of an 
accident," yet he could not have reached the leadership 
of Tammany without the exercise of the deep cunning and 
burrowing instincts which are the leading characteristics of 
his nature. It cannot be denied that, without the advantages 
of education, and handicapped by a coarse, rough, early 
career, the manner in which he seized opportunities and 
stepped to the front, past men of standing and ability 
who stood side by side with him after the retirement of 
John Kelly from leadership, stamps him as a man of courage, 
if not of capacity. 

To understand the situation it is necessary to go back. 
John Kelly in the fall of 1870, while Tweed was reign- 
ing supreme, was spoken of as an opposition candidate for 
Mayor against A. Oakey Hall. There were at that time 
audible murmurs against the Ring, as explained in a preced- 
ing letter, and it was thought that " Honest " John Kelly, 
nominated on an independent ticket and supported by a 
Republican nomination, would be elected. But Tweed, as 
usual, -was so intrenched in the " affections " of the Repub- 
lican machine leaders, that it was soon discovered that 



POtTTICAL CUNNING OF TIIi: PIIESENT BOSS. 7rtl 

Kelly could not receive llcp.iblican support. So, under 
the advice of his pliysician, Kelly went to Europe for 
liis health, altliouti^h Mayor Hall used to say, boastini^ly 
and flippantly, afterwards: " I ani the medical adviser wlio 
drove Kelly to Europe." Kelly remained in Europe un- 
til tlie disclosures of the Ring frauds startled New York 
and resounded throughout the world. On his return, and 
after Tweed's resignation as Grand Sachem of the Tammany 
Society, Kelly was chosen as chairman of a committee 
to reorganize the Tammany organization, all of which I 
liave also explained in a previous letter. During Kelly's 
absence, and up to the time he obtained control of Tam- 
many, Croker was holding a place from " Slippery Dick " 
Connolly. lie now made a quick turn and became an 
early follower of Kelly, which even then showed the politi- 
cal cunning for which he has since become famous. Of 
all Kelly's characteristics, his susceptibility to flattery was 
the most prominent. lie regarded the prefix " Honest" 
to his name not oidy with unfeigned gratification, but was 
induced to believe that, among a million of people, he was 
the only one who could lay claim to that distinction. He 
believed that his judgment was infallible. Any man 
who diifered with him in the smallest particular, after he 
had given his opinion of men or measures, was regarded 
by him with grave suspicion forever after. He needed the 
treacle of flattery to be put on so thickly that its constant ap- 
plication was necessary to his serenity. Notwithstanding 
this failing, he was a man of kindly instincts and inflexible 
integrity. 

The purpose of Kelly's leadership was, if anything, 
too lofty. He would uphold a principle at the sacrifice of 
policy. He would undertake a two years' fight under over- 
whelming odds — as he did with Mayor Grace, whom he de- 
nounced as an ingrate — with as little hesitation as if it were 
only to last a week. He hated sham and false pretence. 



r(52 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

He never harbored the slightest incHnation to make money 
by sm-reptitious methods. He would have scorned to 
use his power and his honorable station as leader of the 
Democracy to bleed corporations. His heart was too good 
to drive struggling City contractors to the wall, by secret 
underhand methods, in order that the profits of such enter- 
prises might be diverted into his own gnsp. He would 
have regarded it as a rank indecency for anyone to assert 
that he controlled Judges in the exercise of their functions. 
He never countenanced the crouching sycophancy of high 
judicial officers, which degrades the judicial station and 
shocks the thinking public. With all his self-importance, 
he would have blushed to receive court, night after night, 
from Supreme Court Judges, who bow so graciously and 
smile so sweetly, careless of who may be observing them, 
when showing homage to the Boss, as the time for their re- 
election approaches. In the most supreme phase of his 
audacity, he would not have dared to admit, even if it were 
true, that he retired a Judge from the Bench who refused 
to obey his mandate. Kelly would have thrown up his 
hands in holy horror at the suggestion that a leader of the 
Democracy could make money out of the crimes and 
frailties and misfortunes of human nature. Had an Investi- 
gating Committee overtaken him, how proud would his 
answers have made Democrats ! With what exultation 
would his followers have read in their homes and public 
places, that their leader had fearlessly given an account 
of his stewardship ; that his public life was an open book ; 
that he could tell the people of the State, through its In- 
vestigating Committee, that the leader of New York City's 
Democracy had no unaccountable wealth ; that, so far from 
any part of his means being covered with suspicion, he 
could lay bare, without fear or hesitation, the sources of 
his comparatively modest fortune. Although no man 
was more fearless, Kelly would have felt that it was his 



now CROKER CAME TO THE FllONT. 763 

duty to answer; that the honor of his party in this City 
was involved in his integrity as leader; that, as the great 
mass of the Democratic array were honest men, earning 
tlieir livelihood by the ssveat of their brows, it was due 
to tliem that their leader must show himself, without tech- 
nicality or (juibble, to be an honest and honorable man. 
He would have felt so degraded, had he to hide himself 
behind sham defences, that, in the interest of his party, if 
not for very shame, he would have promptly resigned his 
loadei'ship, and he would probably have had sense enough 
not to tarry until his humiliated followers retired him, as 
they undoubtedly would. 

John Kelly was honorable, sensitive, proud. His self- 
esteem developed into great conceit and great vanity. But, 
with all his vanity, it is incredible that he would have been 
silly enough to say, as did his saintly successor, Richard 
Croker, in his interview with an English editor, that in his 
whole life he never did one act which he "ought not to 
have done," nor would he have indulged in the pharisaical 
hypocrisy of saying, " I have done only good all my life." 
Kelly was a man of strong attachments to those who could 
worm themselves into his affections. This Croker had suc- 
ceeded in doing, and thus he became close to Kelly. But 
tliis closeaess was not on the basis of equality at all, or on 
the theory of holding consultation with Croker on any of 
the grave political problems which gave Kelly such dis- 
turbance ; for, while he had confidence in Croker's loyalty, 
he well knew his deficiency intellectually. So that Croker's 
relations with Kelly might perhaps be better understood 
by describing him as Kelly's political servitor, who enjoyed 
the great man's confidence in numerous little things. It 
is therefore easy to understand how, on Kelly's partial 
retirement from leadership, all the executive work was car- 
ried on by Croker, and how the district leaders, knowing 
his relations to the Boss, began to take orders from him. 



'i'64 THIRTY YEARS 01* MEW YORK POLITICS. 

This system of conducting the affairs of the organization 
continued until Kelly's death. Then the control became 
apparently lodged in four persons — Richard Croker, James J. 
Martin, Thomas F. Gilroy and W. Bourke Cockran, Then 
there were George H. Forster, Frederick Smyth, Hugh J. 
Grant and (later) Henry D. Purroy, who stood close to this 
central control. I said control, not power ; for, in truth, they 
had no power, because they had no patronage. Tammany's 
patriotism and burning love for popular rights are bound 
up in that one word " patronage." The Tammany people 
had hardly an office in the whole City goverment. Those 
were hungry days for Tammany. Kelly did it. His reck- 
less fights, his unbending stubborness, which many of his 
followers irreverently but whisperingly termed " pigheaded- 
ness," had expatriated the old organization from the pastur- 
age which was theirs by right of inheritance, and a merci- 
less band, whom the Tammany orators described as " Goths 
and Yandals," had taken possession of the "fleshpots." 
Tilden and Robinson and Whitney and Thompson gave 
Tammany no quarter, and of course no patronage. It was 
easy to settle differences among Tammany leaders in those 
days. Indeed, they had no differences, for there was 
nothing to differ about. Had Richard Croker, or James J. 
Martin, or Thomas F. Gilroy, been asked to take the abso- 
lute Bosship of Tammany, every one of them would have 
modestly declined. Each would meekly have said that he 
was not good enough for so high an honor. So they all worked 
together in perfect harmony, like so many turtle doves, 
" for the good of the party." It was solemnly announced 
that Tammany Hall would never again have a Boss ; that 
Bossism was dead forever ; and that a " broad and liberal " 
administration of Tammany Hall, where " every man will 
have a voice," was now established forever more. 

The brainy men of Tammany — Cockran, Gilroy, Martin 
and Forster — laid plans to restore Tammany's shattered 



EFFORTS OF BRAINY MEN TO LTIiL'ILD TAMMANY. :(\:> 

fortunes. Tliey worked lahorionsly and intelli<i;ently. Tlicy 
studied the art of eateliing votes. For every wind they 
adroitly set the Tannnany sails. Preanihles and resohitions 
on almost every conceivable public topic were prepared by 
them and hurled forth from time to time on an unsuspect- 
ing community as the " voice of Tammany Hall." Cockran, 
the eloquent, wonld speak to these resolutions (which lie 
himself had drawn) and rouse up the drooped and drooping 
spirits of the Tammany hosts, and even decoy them into 
momentary applause. No higher tribute could be paid to 
eloquence ; for Tammany had no use for shouting, iu the 
absence of patronage. The resolutions themselves were 
masterpieces. One of these fulmiuations would breathe 
forth, in the highest forms of rhetoric, " the sacred rights 
of the people." Another would dilate in scathing terms on 
the " gross wrongs to the working classes." Another would 
denounce in weird language '' the crushing and grinding 
monopolies." Another would make frantic appeals for 
" home rule." Still another would hysterically appeal to 
oppressed fellow citizens to shake off " the paralyzing grasp 
of political dictators" — which, in this case, meant the 
County Democracy. 

Not satisfied with thus endeavoring to adjust domestic 
affairs, they widened the sphere of their paternal functions. 
With a burning zeal in the cause of humanity, they adopted 
resolutions, in soul- stirring periods, sympathizing with " the 
Irish people in their noble struggle for freedom," and, so 
as not to be suspected of partiality, tliey issued terrific de- 
nunciations of the '' despotic tyranny in Siberia." In fact, 
they declared, by the most solemn asseverations, that Tam- 
many Hall was ready at all times to step forward and crush 
out wrong and injustice wherever they might appear in any 
quarter of the globe. 

Human nature is queer. After a while the people began 
to listen, then to be attracted, and finally to be captured by 



766 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the flowery chaff of eloquence spread before them. Croker 
had as much to do with all this as the Man in the Moon. 
But he was around, and looked wise. ISTo man that ever 
lived was half as wise as Croker sometimes looks. By his 
cunning methods, hints, smiles, winks and innuendoes, he 
convinced many that it was he who was setting the whole 
machinery in motion. Was he believed ? Wait and see. 

While Tammany was thus engaged in this process of 
political inoculation, the leaders of the County Democracy 
were pompously parading the political arena. Thompson, 
day after day and night after night, gorging himself like 
another Heliogabalus ; Power (Maurice J.) as imperious as 
Bismarck, occasionally studying Webster's Dictionary to 
pick out some big word wlierewith to dumbfound his fol- 
lowers, or, rather, the followers of his patronage, for he had 
no followers J96r se j Costigan, the gay and festive humor- 
ist, whose skill in politics was even superior to his wit ; 
William Pitt Mitchell, the bland, the sweet and resigned 
apostle of political prosperity ; and a score of others, of 
more or less, but generally of less, ]3olitical importance. And 
so they went along, or strutted along, apparently uncon- 
scious of the growing strength of Tammany Hall. 

Abram S. Hewitt was Mayor. He hated Tammany then. 
He was a great intellectual force. In many respects, his 
ideas of running the City government were commendable. 
But he was testy, abrupt and irritable. He was irreproach- 
ably honest in all his intentions. He received so many 
encomiums as a model public servant, that he regarded him- 
self as another Daniel come to judgment. But the wisest 
man that ever lived is apt to run up against a snag in New 
York politics. Mayor Hewitt at this time bumped against 
a big one, which helped to bring disaster to him and his 
faction. 

On March 7, 1888, a committee, representing a Conven- 
tion of 200 Irish- American societies, visited Mayor Hewitt, 



MAYOR HEWITT AND THE IRISH FLAC. 767 

at the (^ity llall, to invite liim to review the fortliconiin<^^ 
St. Patrick's Day Parade, after tlie fashion set by other 
Mayors for nearly two score years before. The Couimittee 
comprised Edward L. Carey, IIui!;h Murray, James Mullins, 
Peter ALadden, Terence Reilly, Daniel Cullen, John Mc- 
(ruire, Terence Donahue, Michael Finnegan and Edward 
DowdelL How the deputation was received by Mayor 
Hewitt is thus narrated in the San of tlie next morning : 

With bis hands deep ia his pockets the Mayor said : " I may be a 
candidate for .Mayor or Governor or for President [here the Mayor 
turned a humorous ghuice on the bystanders], and I may want all the 
Democratic votes I can get. We all know that the Irish vote is strong 
enough to elect any candidate in this City for whom it is cast. But, 
for the purpose of getting that vote, I shall not consent to review any 
parade, be it Irish, or Dutch, or Scotch, or German, or English. I tell 
jou now that I shall review no parades except those which I am offi- 
cially required as 3Iayor to review." 

This unexpected fiat refusal took the Committee's breath away for a 
moment. Then ]Mr. Carey said that every Mayor, for thirty seven years, 
had reviewed the procession on St. Patrick's Day, and none of them 
thought it was lowering his dignity to do so. 

" We do not ask this as Irishmen, but as Irish- Americans," he said. 
' ' Previous Mayors thought themselves honored in being asked to review 
the parade gf the Irish Societies. Even you yourself last year asked to 
be excused, not because you objected to doing so, but on account of 
your rheumatism. We believed this year that St. Patrick had taken 
the rheumatism all out of you, and it would give you pleasure to review 
us. We believed that, in honoring us with your presence, you also were 
honoring yourself." 

But by this time the Mayor was ushering the Committee toward the 
door. 

" Gentlemen, you have my answer," he said. "I shall not review 
your parade on St. Patrick's Day." 

There are some men so constituted that, after being satis- 
tied they committed a blunder, instead of making an effort 
to rectify it, they go on, so to speak, improving on it. So 
it was with Abram S. Hewitt. The politicians of the 
County Democracy, who were sponsors for Hewitt, dis- 
turbed at the probable political effect of Hewitt's behavior, 



^68 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

claimed tliat perhaps the Mayor was not approached in the 
proper way, or that he might have been sick that day, and 
that the matter would be made all right before the day of 
the parade. The Tammany politicians, on the other hand, 
professed to be greatly shocked at the Mayor's irreverence 
and were, of course, visibly affected. Then the public press, 
to add fuel to the flame, discussed the subject from every 
standpoint with as much apparent gravity as it would a 
declaration of war by the President. The newspapers had 
great fun for several days. But Hewitt took the discussion 
seriously, and he began to study the subject for himself 
The more he studied, the worse it grew for the County 
Democracy, and the better for Tamman;)^ The time was 
when Mayors were only too proud to see the Irish Flag 
floating over the City Hall on St. Patrick's Day. But the 
result of Hewitt's study convinced him that such a demon- 
stration was hostile to our institutions and menacing to our 
liberties. And so he cruelly ordered that the ensigu of 
Erin should not wave from the flagstaff of the City Hall. 
Neither the ponderous logic of Power, nor the persuasive 
suavity of Costigan, nor the oracular admonitions of Mitchell, 
nor George Caulfield, nor Billy Butler, nor " Fatty " Walsh, 
nor the whole Executive Committee of the New Amsterdam 
Club (where the County Democracy leaders used to recline 
at ease) could shake Hewitt from his awful purpose to ignore 
the Irish flag. Once having torn himself loose, having 
gnawed to pieces as it were, like a ferocious tiger, the political 
bands that bound him, Hewitt rushed fortli with daring 
recklessness ; for, not content with what he had already 
said and done, he now publicly insulted the entire Irish 
element. He gave out to the public an elaborate analysis 
of the inmates of Alms Houses and pointed with glee to 
the number of Irish who were living on the charity of the 
City. He announced that he was going to run for re-election 
as Mayor, and his evident purpose was to test the question, 



LOCHIEL SCORNS THE WIZARD'S TALE. 700 

once for all, wliotlier by thus boldly avowing his disregard 
of the Irish vote and influence, the native American element, 
supported by the Germans and others, would not consoli- 
date their forces upon him and bring him in a victor. 

At this the people of New York, always broad, liberal 
and sensible, made up their minds that Ilewitt enter- 
tained prejudices which were unworthy of him. New 
Yorkers have never failed, at any rate in modern times, to 
stamp this out whenever they have caught a clear sight of 
it. Election time came on, and the County Democracy, 
" all plaided and plumed in their tartan array," with Lochiel 
Hewitt as their standard-bearer, took the field. The County 
Democracy owned almost everything in sight in the way of 
public othce and public patronage, with all the innumerable 
ramifications of influence incident thereto. Ilewitt, a mil- ' 
lionaire, a former member of Congress, with a national repu- 
tation as a statesman — he to be beaten in his native city, 
which he had so long honored and blessed by his presence ? 
Nonsense ! Who could do it ? When Wizard Power whis- 
pered advice to him, on the eve of the battle, to take a back 
track on the Irish matter, and beat a diplomatic retreat, and 
imploringly begged him to save himself, and especially 
Power and the others from destruction, Lochiel Hewitt be- 
came indignant and replied (in substance) : 

"Down, soothless insulter ! I trust not the tale; for never shall 
Hewitt a destiny meet, so black with dishonor, so foul with retreat. 
Though my perishing ranks should be strewed in their gore, with 
Mitchell and Costigan and a thousand such more, Hewitt, untainted by 
flight or by chains, while the kindling of life in his bosom remains, 
shall victor exalt, or in death be laid low, with his back to the field and 
his feet to the foe, and leaving in battle no blot on his name, look 
proudly to Heaven from the death-bed of fame." 

The Wizard, now thoroughly alarmed for Lochiel's men- 
tal condition, retired in melancholy disorder. 

Why should not Hewitt have courage ;' For, thought he, 
who 'are my opponents? Joel P. Ei-hardt, a Republican, 



770 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

who can at best only poll the machine vote of his party, 
and the Tammany candidate, Hugh J. Grant, a callow- 
youth, of defective education. But the eccentricity of the 
people is marvellous ! Grant came in first with a plurality 
of 41,074; Erhardt came in second; while the philosopher, 
the statesman, the lecturer and reformer, lagged behind, 
dejected and bedraggled. It was a fight for a principality. 
The County Democracy lost. Now all their rich possess- 
ions were to be taken away from them. Who did all this ? 
The County Democracy leaders blamed Hewitt, alleging 
that his senseless assault on the Irish element did it. Hewitt, 
on the other hand, stated that the County Democracy lead- 
ers, with their suspicious affluence, with their favorite con- 
tractors who were bilking the city, with their flock of 
buzzards hovering about the several Departments, with 
their insolence and total disregard of public opinion, dis- 
gusted the honest voter and brought disaster even on so 
good a man as himself. Perhaps, when you reflect a little, 
you may conclude that both sides were jointly liable. 

But, to return to Tammany, for we now behold her in 
great power. Now, here is where Croker comes in. It 
was Croker who brought about Grant's nomination. Grant 
had some money left to him by his father, who kept a 
liquor store. Croker held Grant in the palm of his haud. 
Grant's personality was that of a mere baby, compared with 
Croker's. Recorded as having been in college. Grant had 
more opportunities of education than Croker, but he was 
far from being a man of mental or moral strength, although 
endowed with a certain degree of cunning. Croker ruled 
him with a rod of iron ; but, after seasons of shameful sub- 
serviency. Mayor Grant, on one occasion, revolted against 
the Boss's mandate. Croker demanded that he appoint 
John J. Seannell (of whom I have spoken in a previous 
letter) a Fire Commissioner. Afraid that the press would 
flay him, as it threatened to do, if he appointed a man who 



GREATKST I'OI.ITICAL SHOW ON EAKTII. 771 

had emptied lour cdiaiuhors of a revolver into a fellow 
citizen, Grant refused— it is sui.l, with tears in his eyes. 
That settled his political future. Croker had hy this tiuie 
safely lod<^ed his personal friends as heads of the public 
Departments, or in some other positions of influence politi- 
callv. Althoui;h Mayor Grant had made the appointments, 
none of the appointees tlumked him. They thanked Croker, 
just exactly as all the heads of Departments of the present 
day thank Croker for their positions, and not Mayor Van 
Wyck. So Croker waited until Grant's term expired, and 
then retired him for his refusal to take orders. He knew 
Grant's weakness and incapacity, and feared him not. But 
he feared others who were co-operating with himself in ap- 
parent friendship, and he (quietly determined to gradually 
clip their wings. 

In the course of time, all the men of ability or ambition 
in Tammany Hall— Cockran, Gilroy, Martin, Clarke, Pur- 
roy and others— were sent to the rear as a precautionary 
measure by Boss Croker. Some of them were formally 
ousted. One of the most brilliant men who ever occupied 
the attention of the entire country was W. Bourke Cockran, 
while for two terms he was a Representative from this city 
in Congress. But in a fatal hour he assumed to think and 
act for himself . This, according to Croker's political ethics, 
was a flagrant act of hostility against the machine, which is 
personified in Croker, and at the following election he re- 
tired Cockran from a post where he was not only useful to 
his party but to the country. 

But perhaps the methods which Croker adopted to keep 
in absolute control will be best illustrated by the way in 
which a witty friend of mine explained his unshaken i)ower. 
" Boss Croker," said he, " keeps in the saddle by his own 
cunnmg. He is another P. T. Barnum ; for he has a big 
circus.^ Croker is now the proprietor of the Greatest 
Political Show on Earth. lie runs it, too, and makes no 



778 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

bones about telling the whole world that he is the owner 
of it. He controls the box office and gets all the gate 
money. So you see he starts in right. Whenever any of 
his exhibits gets too frisky, or tries to get too near the box 
office, he turns him out to forage on the highway. After 
Van Wyck's election as Mayor, what did he do with the 
hundreds of big appointments at his disposal ? He gave 
them to a lot of nobodies. He took into the circus ring 
only the old, broken-down wheel-horses and farm stock, 
groomed them up, put them in fine places, fed them well 
— aye, on gilded oats, as it were, as did that jocose Roman 
Emperor who thought of making one of his horses a con- 
sul. He gave them front positions, paraded them around 
the ring with fine trappings on them, until they began to 
feel and look like the blooded stock of Arabia. What 
more could such fellows expect ? Do you blame Croker, 
then, for taking charge of the box office or turning down 
and out all those mulish animals of the herd that began 
to get too gay ? 

" Suppose Barnum's zebra, or unicorn, or even his Cir- 
cassian Lady, or Wild Man of Borneo, had claimed a right 
to keep tab on the receipts of the circus, and demanded a 
rake-off or percentage, how long would Phineas T. Bar- 
num have tolerated such insolence ? In the same way, 
when any of these exhibits in the Croker circus forgets 
the Ringmaster's whip, and begins to caper as if he were 
an indispensable feature, why shouldn't Dick turn him out 
of the show ? Although the horse intended for the consul- 
ship by the Roman Emperor was as well-qualified for that 
position as are some of Croker's selections for heads of 
City Departments, they are, for this very reason, the more 
easily managed." 

"But," said I, "a Boss who aims to be Boss of the 
Greatest Political Show on Earth, as you say Croker re- 
gards Tammany Hall, should have at least one or two 



"DEAD EASY FOR CKoKEl! TU KEEP ON TOP." 7W 

Koyal Beiii^al tiijers in his zoological collection, even for 
the sake of appearances ?" 

'' Appearances cnt no ice in this show," said my friend. 
" Croker wants everythini^ safe. He takes in at least as 
much dust [money] this way, and there is no howling or 
disturbance among the animals, as there surely would be 
if he let in blooded ]5engal tigers. Croker swore before 
the Mazet Committee that he was running the show for 
what there was in it, or words to tliat effect, and that he 
was working for his own pocket every day in the week. 
All of the make-believe bloods he puts to the front in the 
prominent stalls are only too glad of their good luck. 
They keep quiet and have nothing to sa}' ; for they would 
be feeding on nettles and thistles if Croker had not led 
them to the rich munici})al crib. So you see," he con- 
cluded, '' it's now dead easy for him to keep on top in the 
game." 

This is all true. Mr. Croker is entirely safe, so far as 
any revolt in Tammany Hall is concerned. Every one of 
the thirty-five Assembly District leaders, in the Boroughs 
of Manhattan and Bronx (the City of New York, before 
recent annexations), with possibly a few exceptions, holds 
an important public office at the hands of Croker. These 
])ositions are for a term of years. Each of the leaders 
is the distributor of a large amount of patronage, always, 
however, with the approval of the Boss. There is not one 
of them has the ability, even if he had the courage, to in- 
augurate a movement against despotic dictation. Instead, 
they vie with each other in showing their homage and 
abject subserviency to their chief, in season and out of sea- 
son. Inflated and pompous as most of them are among 
tht'ir own followers in their respective districts, where 
they imitate, in a circumscribed way, the arbitrary manner 
and conduct of the Boss-in-Chief, yet when they come 
into the presence of Croker they are changed men. They 



774 THIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

bow and scrape ; they look afEable ; they smile ; they would 
not attempt to demand anything as a right; tbey would 
not dare to object to anything as a wrong ; they whisper ; 
they beg ; they entreat. After this subjugation of their 
manhood, they return to their district Clubs with overbear- 
ing manners, and discourse with great nonchalance of what 
they said to Croker, and how they argued with him and 
spoke up to him, and brought him around to their way of 
thinking. All the while the attendant subordinate place- 
holders beam with delight at the recitals, and with many 
nods and other tokens of emphasis indicate their admiration 
of the courage and cleverness of their leader. 

But while Croker is absolutely safe as the head of this 
army of sycophants, is he safe in reality ? 

The insolent manner in which Judge Joseph F. Daly 
was disposed of, in the Fall of 1898, greatly angered the 
thinking people of I^ew York. A great public meeting 
was held to protest against this "direct attack upon the 
independence of the Bench." Everett P. Wheeler, a 
prominent lawyer, and a noted Civil Service Reformer, 
addressing the Bar Association, which issued the call for 
the public meeting, among other things, said : 

" We, wlio are old members of the Bar, can remember when some of 
the Judges of the Supreme Court were dominated by Tweed and 
Sweeny. We, who practiced in those days, linow that, if one of them 
had an interest in a, case, it was decided not upon its merits, but by the 
power behind the throne. * * * When a political leader starts to 
drive a Judge (as he, Croker, is now trying to do) from the Bench, he 
will not stop there, but will proceed to demand decisions in cases. This 
leader frankly says— and it is a bolder thing than Tweed ever did in 
his palmiest days — that the man elected by Tammany Hall must abide 
by the dictates of Tammany Hall, and that means its leader." 

A mass meeting was held at Carnegie Hall on October 
21, 1898. It was a meeting like that which was held on 
the 4th of September, 1871 (described in a former letter) 
which answered Tweed's insolent question, " What are you 



INDIGNATION AGAINST BOSS INSOLENCE. 775 

' going to do about it? " and was tlie first great step toward 
liurling him from power. At the meeting in Carnegie 
Hall, ex-^Iayor Abram S. TIewitr, in making the opening 
speech to the seven thousand citizens assL-mhled, said: 

"The most precious possession of ii free people is an liouest and 
fearless .Tiuiiciary. The immortal declaration in Ma.i^na C'hartti, 'that 
justice shall not be sold.' is the very foundation of our rights and 
liberties. The President or Governor cannot attempt to control the 
Courts without becoming liable to impeachment. What Presidents 
and Governors cannot do, a private citizen, huMing no commi.ssion 
fr.mi the people, and responsible to no constituted authority, arrogates 
to himself, and claims the right to impose his will upon the Judges 
whom he has created He is not only Judge-maker, but Judge-execu- 
tioner, lie thus becomes the foundation of Judicial life and death. 
This preposterous claim, which can only spring from the abnormal 
com]>ination of intellectual aberration with colossal self-conceit, is a 
challenge to the community not to be disregarded without the loss of its 
self-respect and of its freedom." 

Joseph II. Choate, now United States Ambassador to 
England, prevented by illness from attending the meeting, 
sent the following letter : 

" If Mr. Ccoker is to have his way, and in placs of Judges who have 
served the people well, is by his sole authority to appoint those 
who, he is satisfied, will show him * proper consideration ' in the dis- 
charge of their judicial functions, we are in danger of relapsing into 
that condition with regard to our Courts, which the late James T. 
Brady, of ever-honored and beloved memory, referred to, when he said 
that ' it was better to know the Judge than to know the Law.' " 

.^^^. Croker was very' angry, at this time, \^th the Bar 
Association, and it was said gave orders for the formation 
of a new one. Some of his followers among the lawyers 
called a meeting: of members of the Bar who were not con- 
nected with the existing Bar Association, for the purpose 
of organizing the new movement. Mr, Charles Strauss, 
a Commissioner of Education and a lawyer of capacity and 
character, appears to have been the prime mover in the 
affair. There was a good deal of talk in the public press, 
by Mr. Strauss, about the numbers that were willing to 
r 



776 TniRTV YEARS OF NEW YORK POLlTlCf^. 

join it, and the spirit that animated them, and so forth, and 
it took at least two weeks before Mr. Strauss discovered that 
every sensible man in New York was laughing at the move- 
ment. Perhaps what first enlightened him on the subject 
was the concluding part of Mr. Choate's letter which said : 

"I cordially approve of Mr. Croker's proposition for the formation 
of a new Bar Association, which shall be all his own. Then all who 
want lawyers who know the law will know where to go, and those who 
are in search of advocates who know the Judge will be equally well 
provided." 

Ex-Congressman W. Bourke Cockran delivered an elo- 
quent and powerful argument against Boss rule, and con- 
cluded in these significant words : 

" When the day of reaction comes, as come it will, when the people who 
have lavished favors upon the Boss will have risen in fury, charging him 
with crimes of which perhaps he is entirely innocent, clamoring for his 
blood as vehemently as they now applaud his appearance on a platform, 
then the Judge who grovels most abjectly before him now, in the day 
of his power, will be the quickest to take him by the throat in the day 
of his difficulty. Mighty is the downfall and swift the punishment of 
a man like that. 

" No man is more likely to need an independent and fearless Judiciary 
than the man who at the moment is raised above his fellows, exercising 
a limitless and irresponsible power. My friends, I do not believe that 
the people will long submit to tyranny, and they will see to it that a 
despotism such as this will be crushed out." 

A set of resolutions was unanimously adopted by the vast 
assemblage, "from which the following is an extract : 

" No self-respecting people can submit to a condition under which 
one man, assuming to speak for a party organization, shall now make 
the Judges dependent solely upon his will for the continuance of their 
offices, or dictate to them how they shall conduct their judicial func- 
tions. This is not a question of parties or factions. It rises far above 
all such considerations, for it touches our most sacred private interests, 
and directly affects the security of our homes. If a just Judge is to be 
punished for refusing to comply with an improper demand of a political 
Boss, the dignity of the Bench must be inevitably lowered, and its inde- 
pendence paralyzed. The worst fruits of Twecdism were Barnard and 
Cardozo. The ultimate fruits of Crokerism will be Judges chosen from 




W. JiulKKK L'uCKKAN. 



THE FAULT OF -TIIK HKTTFU CLASS." 777 

members of the Bar without character and without consciences ; for 
only those willing to pledc^e obedience to him can be nominated." 

Professor Felix Adler joined in the <jfeiieral iiidi^imtioii, 
aiul before the Ethical (^iilture Society let loose on Mr. 
C'roker ; and ainoui!; other pun<^ent sentences was the fol- 
lowing : 

"lie thinks it right and proper tliat Judgc-^. owned and elected by 
lum, should turn money into his purse. And are we political babies to 
allow this self-appointed master to dictate ; this man, who has publicly 
proclaimed and emblazoned him>elf as the political master of New 
York. ? Why is it that in a City like this, the t:iil rules the head ; that 
the morally undeveloped rule the morally devek)ped ? It's your faidt, 
I say ; the fault of the better class." 

Notwithstanding all these accusations, denunciations and 
predictions, which M'ere published far and wide by the 
pnblic press and in other channels, Croker defeated Judge 
Daly and retired him, for the present at least, into private 
life, while Croker, towering above all in his bad eminence, 
looks down with ineffable scorn upon the " disturbers " of 
his peace. 



LETTER LIX. 

Editor Stead's Dastardly Attempt to Reconstruct Croker 
— Aristotle Eclipsed by the Boss Philosopher— The 
English Editor Laughs and No One Here Blames Him— 
Croker Elucidates Carlyle and Puffs Himself — Un- 
able to Recall One Wrong Act in His Whole Life, ' ' No, 
Not Even One " — The Mazet Cojimittee Comes to the 
Rescue and Makes Croker Talk as We Know Him — 
What the Boss Ought to Do With the English Editor. 

My dear Dean : 

There was an article published about two years ago l)y 
William T. Stead, the distinguished editor of the London 
Revieio of Reviews, from which you and others in Europe 
may have formed a strange opinion of Croker. Hap- 
pening to cross the .ocean in the same steamer, Editor Stead 
interviewed " Statesman " Croker. It was an elaborate in- 
terview. It made Croker talk offhand like a philoso- 
pher, a publicist, and a grammarian. Gladstone or Salisbury 
could hardly have been more broad of grasp or more choice 
of diction. There were some extracts from this interview 
published at that time in certain of the New York papers, 
and they made many people here shake with laughter, while 
others, wath grim irony, asked " Where did Stead get it i "' 

But I cannot resist quoting a few passages from this 
article in the London Review of Reviews for October, 1897, 
now lying on my desk, before I make a few quotations from 
some of Croker's more recent utterances. After a quite 
flattering description of the Boss's appearance, Mr. Stead's 
published interview proceeds : 

"Mr. Croker," I said, "for nearly thirty years you have been up to 
the neck in the rough and tumble of New York politics. For nearly 

778 



CROKER AS A MORAL PHILOSOPHER. 779 

twenty years you liiive been Supreme Boss of Tammany [He has been 
Sviprcme B)ss only twelve years]. Yon are now out of politics contera- 
platinir a serene old aiie [Croker was then lifty-four years old] in the 
rural deiiirhts of your Berkshire seat. You can, therefore, speak dis- 
passionately upon the events of your career. Lookinji; back over the 
whole of tliese thirty years, is there any single act or deed which now, 
in the light of your experience, you regret having done, or that you now 
feel you wish you had left undone V " 

The Boss paused. He removed from his lips his cigar of Brobdingnag, 
and half closed his eyes for a moment. Then, with cahu, deliberate 
emphasis, he replied — 

' ' No, Sir, not one ! I do not remember ever having done anything 
that I ought not to have done. Fori have done only good all my life." 

The steamer was littered with copies of Hall Caine's novel with its 
vehement assertion of the impossibility of leading a Christian life in 
London in the nineteenth century. And here was the great Boss 
of Tammany Hall, after thirty years' experience of the .sternest realities 
of the corrupt life of New York, calmly and placidly asserting that, in 
the whole of his long and eventful career, he had only done what was 
good, and was able to look back over all the incidents of his life with an 
approving conscience. 

IIow })roiid we ought all be of Croker! But we must 
not stop to rejoice over that now, for we have to follow Editor 
Stead, wlio leads Croker into a j^rofound disquisition on 
Tammany Hall and its relations to the New York press : 

" Tammany Hall," Mr. Croker began, " is much spoken against. But 
unjustly. You will never understand anything about New York politics 
if you believe all that they [the public press] write in the papers. 
They are always abusing Tammany. But the real truth is just the 
opposite of what they say. Tammany's reputation has been sacrificed 
by newspaper men, whose sole desire is to increa.se their circulation, ap- 
pealing to the itch for change and a malignant delight in the misfortunes 
of our fellows." 

As Squeers would say, " There's richness for you." But 
let us not interrupt Stead : 

" Do you think the world is built in exactly that way, Mr. Croker? ' 
I asked. 

'• No, sir," he replied, with emphasis, " it is not built that way, but 
quite another way. These things 1 speak of are temporary ; the perma- 
nent law of the world and humanity is quite dillerent. You asked me 



780 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

how it was Tammany was overthrown three years ago, and I have told 
you. But the issue of an election is but an incident. The Jaw that 
governs has exceptions. The exception proves the rule." 

"And what is the rule?" I asked, somewhat curious to know the 
Boss's theory of the Universe. " What is the underlying fundamental 
law of the Universe?" 

"Sir," said Mr. Croker, speaking with quiet gravity, " the law is that 
although wrongdoing may endure for a season, right must in the long 
run come to the top. Human nature is not built so that roguery can 
last. Honest men must come to their own, no matter what the odds 
against them. There is nothing surer than that. Lying, calumny and 
thieving may have their day, but they will pass. Nothing can last but 
truth." 

This is really sublime, and puts Aristotle in the shade. 
But Stead is not yet through, for he draws Croker out still 
further : 

"Really, Mr. Croker," I exclaimed, " what an optimist you are ! I 
have not found so gr«at faith, no, not in Israel," I added, laughing. 

There is not a man in New York that will blame Mr. 
Stead for laughing. But he ought to have laughed a good 
deal more as Croker proceeded : 

"That's right," Mr. Croker replied. "If you put ten honest men 
into an assembly with ninety thieves, human nature is such that the 
ten honest men will Boss the ninety thieves. They must do it. It is 
the law of the world. 

"All evil, whether lying or thieving, by it? nature cannot last. [This 
is the fervent hope of many citizens of New York.] Honest John Kelly 
who was Boss before me," continued Mr. Croker, "when I first came 
into politics, before he was Boss he always used to tell me that never 
mind the odds against you, if you are in the right. Being in the right 
is more than odds. Keep on hammering away and you are sure to 
win." 

As Mr. Croker sauntered along, airing his political philosophy. I asked 
him if he had ever read Carlyle's Lecture on Mahomet in his book on 
"Hero W<)rshi2D." 

"No," said the Boss; "what did he say ?" 

"Something very much like whit you have been saying now," I 
replied ; and I quoted as b st I cou.d the familiar passage : " One cur- 
rent hypothesis about Mahomet, tlftit he was a scheming impostor, a 
falsehood incarnate, that his religion is a mere mess of quackery and 
fatuity, begins really to be now untenable to any one. * «• * These 



CARIALI-: SUSTAINED HV TAMMAMV. <«l 

theories are the product of an age of scepticism ; they iiulicut.- the sad- 
dest spiritual paralysis and mere death-life of the souls of men. More 
godless theory, I tliiuk, was never promulgated on this earth. A false 
man found a religioa ? Why, a false man cannot build a brick house 1 
If he did not know and follow truly the properties of bricks and 
mortar, burnt elav and what else he works in, it is no house that he 
makes, but a rubbish heap. It will not stand for twelve centuries to 
lodge a hundred and eighty mil ions, and will fall straightway. A 
man must conform him.self to nature s law, be verily in coramunion with 
nature and the truth of things, or nature will an.swcr him, ' No, not 

at all.' " . „ 

"That's right," said Richard Croker, " and Tammany proves it. 

Bravo, Croker ! How quickly lie grasped Carlyle's mean- 
ing ! After a brief pause for reflection, Croker (as 
reported by Mr.- Stead) then delivered himself of this sage 
and aesthetic piece of philosophy : 

"Of course in an ideal world," said Mr. Croker, "every citizen 
should be so dominated by patriotic or civic motives that from sheer 
unselfish love of his fellow men he would spend nights and days in 
laboring for their good." 

Now to be serious. To represent Croker as giving 
utterance to such language, or as being even capable of 
comprehending its meaning, is to make him ridiculous. If 
there were the slightest basis upon which one might strain 
a point, there might be some excuse for Stead's per- 
formance. It is easy to understand how some lickspittle 
of a politician, who holds a place in the City government 
at the will of Croker, writes his "interviews" at the 
Democratic Club, or even how a certain sycophantic Su- 
preme Court Judge submits to Croker, (after he exult- 
inirly shows it to two or three other smiling Judges who 
frecpient the club to pay court to the Boss), some well 
written, or at least carefully written, "suggestions" as to 
what might be advantageously given out to the public ; but 
it is ditiicult to see why a proud Englishman, or a proud 
man of any kind, or even a man like Stead, who may not 
be proud, will manufacture out of whole cloth prolonged, 



78^ raiRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

scholarly and sapient utterances as emanating from Croker, 
and seriously publish them as such to the world. To 
discuss this particular subject is far from being agree- 
able to me. Nothing but the extraordinary attitude of 
Stead would induce me to do so. But it becomes neces- 
sary in the interests of correct history. Truth demands 
that Stead's statement be challenged, and, perhaps 
more than challenged. I do not criticise Croker for his 
glaring defects in the rudiments of education, nor for his 
utter incapacity to even follow the meaning of Stead's 
philosophic reflections. Many great and able men have 
been deficient in scholarship; some have been virtually 
illiterate, and their lack of early schooling served but to 
emphasize the grandeur of their later achievements. But 
mark you, in less than two years after the al leered academic 
talks ^vith Stead, Croker is summoned before the Mazet 
Legislative Committee, in the year of our Lord 1899, and 
questioned by its counsel, Mr. Moss. Here are a few ver- 
batim extracts from the stenographic report of the hearing : 
Q, (by Moss)-" You did not find any fault with the way I (when 
Police Commissioner) was doing my work? " 
A. (by Croker)— " You done it good." 
Q. "It was not inactiveness? " 

A. "No; you went straight to the Bowery and done all you could over 
there. " 

********** 
Q. "But you have done so about the Philadelphia Ice Company? " 
A. " Oh, I told you that jUst because you were so anxious." 
Q. "And did you not talk with persons about Devery beino- made 
Chief of Police?" 
A. "I helped to make him Chief; I done all I could for him " 

* * * * * * * * *■* 
Q. " WJiy didn't you want to have it (Judge Pryor's check for cam- 
paign assessments) drawn to the Treasurer of the organization?" 

A. "I don't know— there was a lot of talk them days about Judo-es " 

* * * * * * * * * * 
Q. " My questions were perfectly plain: that the Air and Power Co 

was meant, and you have distinctly sworn to your connection with 



HE "DON'T BELONG TO NO AIll COMTANY." 783 

A. " You ha^e got tho two comp.'iQie-} mixwl up, I dou'l litlon;^ to 
DO Air C'omp iny at all." 

It is needless to tell any intelligent liuiuaii heiiii;- that 
any person capable of using, in 18UT, the language at- 
tributed to Croker in the Reiuew of Her/'ew^', could 
not possibly so deteriorate in ;i couple of years as to answer 
Mops in the manner recorded by the stenographer in 
the foregoing extracts. 

"What Stead's impelling purpose may have been, of course 
it is impossible for me to fathom or determine. That he 
did grossly and grotesquely misrepresent Croker, by 
putting such finely turned sentiments and phrases into 
Croker's mouth, is clear as a demonstration in Euclid. 
Stead ought to be punished by being made a Tammany 
Sachem. 

You must bear in mind that Croker was off-hand, so 
to speak, in his chats aboard-ship with Editor Stead, while 
he was forearmed and on his mettle to encounter the hostile 
Mazet Committee. It is through no inadvertence or col- 
loquial slips that Croker plays havoc with the rules of 
grammar. On the contrary, I am free to wager that, if 
Croker's political kingdom in New York depended on it, 
he could not sit down and correct the grammatical blunders 
in his testiiiiony. Were his attention directed to them, he 
would doubtless ask, in sheer amazement: "What's the 
matter with them words? I don't see nothing wrong with 
them ! " 

Your Oliver Cromwell had an ugly wart on his face, but 
he told the painter not to conceal it in the ])ortrait. It is 
now in order for artist Stead to explain why, or how, he 
Mas induced to tone down or polish away all the mental and 
lingual warts of ^'ew York's present Boss — the Lord Pro- 
tector of Tammany. 



LETTEE LX. 

Gossipy Talk with Alderman Curly— Graphic Description 
OF Boss Croker's Early Career— His Start in Politics 
— A Protege of Ex-Sheriff O'Brien— Fatal Brawl in 
a Memorable Election Contest — The Alderman Laughs 
Over the Joke on Larry Doolen, and Gives His Ideas of 
Why the Boss Finds It Advantageous to Go Abroad — 
Kills Two Birds With One Stone and Turns His Shrewd 
Foresight to Political Advantage — The Melancholy 
Story op Judge Ledwith — His Treachery to His Fol- 
lowers Recoils Upon Himself— How It Advantaged 
Judge Barrett, and the Good Turn Boss Croker Did 
THE Latter. 

My dear Dean : 

One afternoon in May, 1899, while taking lunch at an 
up-town hotel in this City, ex- Alderman Pat Curly, whom 
I have known for many years, came in and sat at the same 
table with me. The Alderman (as he is still called) pos- 
sesses a natural fund of quiet humor, and although born in 
this city, his accent and manner become perceptibly Hiber- 
nicised when he is telling some humorous anecdote or re- 
citing some of his early escapades in local politics. He had 
scarcely been seated when he said, with a quizzical look : 
" Did you read Dick Croker's speech in rhyme ? " 

" No," I said. " What is it ? " 

" By me soul," said the Alderman, " I cut it out of the 
paper this morning before breakfast, and if I showed it to 
one I did to fifty since then, and for why ? " continued the 
Alderman, with emphasis. " Because it's dead right. Those 
Mazet people ought to take a tumble to themselves, and 
quit guying the public ; the^^ should go home and give us a 
rest, and take a long one themselves. They are trying to 

784 



CROKER'S SPEECH IN' UIIV.MK. 785 

find out wlicre Dick Crolver iiot liis monev. Well, it's flead 
certain ho didn't «^ct it out of any of that gang. Jle'd bu a 
good one that could get anything out of Mazet, or Moss, or 
the rest of tliLMU. Tliey put Dick on th(3 stand, prodded him 
hard this time, hut he was too fiy for them mugs, and he 
broke u[) their little game." 

It is not everyone who can understand the Ahlerman. 
I was at a loss to know, from his manner, whether he 
meant what he was saying or was speaking ironically ; but 
I became convinced it was irony when he said, with a 
laugh : " But I near forgot Dick's last speech to the jMazet 
crowd before he left for Europe." Then he pulled out of 
his vest pocket a clipping from the New York World, and 
said, as he handed it to me, " Oh, I tell you, Dick is a great 
man." The clipping read as follows : 

Those Mazet people make me smile. 
Inquiring bow we made our pile 
And why we own Manhattan Isle — 
Myself — and ]\Ie. 

With curiosity they burn ; 
Just how we got it they would learn, 
But that we know is our concern — 
Myself — and Me. 

They'd pry into our bonding scheme. 

And find out how we skim the cream 

Of all the business — that's no dream — 

Myself— and Piatt. 

They're out for boodle ; so are we ; 
And while we're Boss will always be ; 
On that point we won't disagree — 
Myself — and ^le. 

They've had us on the witness rack ; 
Now we'll seek pleasure at the track. 
And if we lose, why, we'll come back — 
Myself- and Me. 



<rS6 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

We came back once before dead broke, | 

But quickly raised the dust from folk 
Whom we held up — our little joke — / 

Myself — and Me. / 

" It cannot be said that he is running away from the Mazet 
Committee, as he has already been examined before it, and 
I suppose he will be back in the Fall for the election ? " I 
remarked, after reading the verses. 

" That depends upon circumstances," said the Alderman. 
" If the Mazet people don't make any headway he'll be 
back sure ; but if they uproot things, (and I don't think 
they will,) as the Lexow Committee did in 18t4, you can 
gamble that Dick will remain in Europe." 

" Well," said I, " when the battle is on, his place is here 
as leader of Tammany Hall." 

" Oh, that's all right," said the Alderman; "but do you 
recollect what he did in 1894, and 1896, when Tammany 
was in a hole^ In 1894, when Goff, that terrible cross- 
examiner, was putting the knife into ev^erybody, Croker de- 
clared he was out of politics, and he was for that year. He 
was in Europe that year, too, Piatt had it all his own way 
in that election, and Strong, a Republican, was elected 
Mayor. You see," continued the Alderman, " Croker 
reasoned this way : Ten to one, on account of all the crooked 
things that were exposed, Tammany would be beaten, no 
matter whether Croker took charge of the campaign or 
not; and by going hot into the campaign, Piatt and his 
crowd would have him and his affairs torn to pieces by 
Golf ; and so, he parleys like, and says he's through with 
politics for ever. Piatt knew that the effect of Croker's 
absence in the fight would help to demoralize Tammany 
Hall, the same as the absence of any leader would at that 
critical time. You see that was a kind of position that 
suited both him and Croker. Believing that Tammany was 
going to be beaten anyhow, Dick had everything to gain in 



POUTiCAL TACTR'S OF TIlK BOSS. Mt 

not being In.tlieivd by the Counnittee tlicn ; if lie made :i 
had sliowing on the witness-stand it wouhl liurt 'raunnany, 
he being the head of it. On the other hand, it wa.s no 
satisfaction to Piatt at that time to bother J)iek, and he 
gained a lot by letting up on him. S > now you nnderstand 
why Dick was treated so tenderly,'' remarked the Alder- 
man, with a knowing wink. 

'•Then again," resnmed the Alderman, " in ISOG, when 
Tammany was tossed here and there over the Bryan Silver 
Campaign for President, he stays in Europe and keeps clear 
of the defeat staring the organization in the face. But 
there was a wise policy in all this," said the Alderman ; "it 
uave out the impression that the organization could never 
get along Avithout Croker, because every time he was away 
Tammany got beaten, and tlien, when the coast is clear, he 
conies back, just at the time that Tannnany has a walk-over, 
takes command, and grabs all the credit for her coming in 
a winner. Now, don't tell me he isn't a clever politician! 
When Tammany is down Dick is away ; when Tammany is 
up Dick is here," said he, laughing. 

'• AVell," I said after a pause, " this is a new way to look 
at Croker. I always heard his intimates say that he Avas a 
born fighter, and that as boy and man he had the courage 
of a tiger ? " 

'•That's all right,"' replied the Alderman ; '•he 'is a good 
fighter, but a shrewd one. lie could smell danger quicker 
than anyone I ever knew, even when he was a young fellow. 
I lived in his neighborhood, and although myself and my 
crowd — you may call them gang if y.ou like — were some- 
what younger than Croker's gang, we took in most of the 
fun. As you know, in those days it was politics all the 
vear 'round and the opposing factions kept the ball rolling 
all the time. Jimmy ( )'Brien was Sheriff and he surrounded 
himself with the best material for scrapping. From the 
lirst he took a great shine to Dick Croker, on account of 



788 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

his licking Dickie Lynch in the prize-fight in Jones's Woods. 
Not onlj^ that, but Croker was very quick and strong, and 
man to man lie'd face anybody ; but if Croker saw that the 
other gang was stronger or might have the advantage, he 
could turn a corner as quick as lightning, or parley with 
the enemy. In making the moves he did in 1894 and 1806, 
he was carrying out his old tactics ; but when the storm 
blew over, didn't he get back on Piatt and soak him ? " 

" It is strange, after all Croker went through, that he 
never got into trouble but once," I observed. 

" You refer to the shooting of John McKemia," said the 
Alderman. "Well, let me tell you that there was a great 
wrong done to Dick Croker in that affair. I know all about 
it, and Croker never fired that shot no more than you did. 
I don't forget that certain persons swore they saw him fire 
the pistol, but they knew better. Many of us believed that it 
was George Hicksy who fired the shot, and so did Croker ; 
and then Croker went to jail, and stood his trial, and went 
near being convicted on account of Judge Barrett's terrible 
charge to the Jury, before he would betray his friend 
Hickey, and that must be said to Croker's credit by every 
square man. You see, O'Brien was dead sore on Croker," 
continued the Alderman. " He brought Croker to the 
front and made him Alderman. After that Croker left 
him and took a place from Slippery Dick Connolly, that 
O'Brien was fighting. You know how a man like O'Brien 
feels against a fellow that he thought was ungrateful, and 
then some of his crowd were so bitter against Croker that, 
in order to make themselves solid with O'Brien, they would 
stop at nothing to finish him. Then men like Larry Del- 
mour, Mike Daly, and others left O'Brien in disgust, and 
joined in with Croker. Now," continued the Alderman, 
earnestly, " to convince you that Dick Croker did not fire 
the shot, I can tell you he never carried a pistol in his life, 
and it was not pretended that any one handed him a pistol 



FATAL BHA\\L AT AN ELECTION CONTEST. 789 

during the ructii)U. I lis liaiul.s were too busy for that. 
When young men are together for years, it's well-known 
among them who carries pistols and who don't, and I can 
tell you Croker never carried one." 

*' Well, indeed, I must compliment ]Mr. Croker on his 
nioileration,and on this evidence of his gentle disposition," 
I said, facetiously; seeing which, the Alderman broke in : 

'• Oh, well, that's all right ; but, even if he did carry a 
pistol, or a piece of lead pipe, as some of the other side 
did, there might be good excuse for it. But did I ever 
tell you the joke on Larry Doolen ? " asked the Alderman. 
" Every time I think of it, I can't help laughing," he con- 
tinued, in great merriment. "You see, it was this way : 
Dick Croker, Doolen, Hickey and others were staunch 
followers of Jimmy O'Brien. O'Brien was then Sheriff, 
and he had a crowd behind him that were red hot. It 
M'asn't "safe to say much against O'Brien in his Ward, 
those days. lie was very liberal to the poor, and gave 
away tons upon tons of coal to helpless families every 
Winter while he was Sheriff, and in fact after that time, 
before he went broke ; and then if he couldn't give an 
office to some worthy young fellows in his crowd, do you 
know he'd make out a list, a private pay-roll like, and he'd 
pay them so much a month each, yes, as high as a hundred 
dollars a month to some of 'em, out of his own pocket. 
You see, the way the Sheriff's office was run in them days, 
it was easy worth to O'Brien $200,000 a year. So you can 
understand he^liad a lively gang around him, and then, 
with his having tlie poor people all praising him, it wasn't 
good for a man to go about l)eefing against O'Brien, any 
more than it was against Tweed himself. 

" But to come back to Larry Doolen. There was a green 
grocer, up in Second Avenue, an Irishman named O'Neil. 
I said green grocer, but tiiat isn't saying he was a green 
Irishman. O'Neil was a kind of a crank, ready to lind 



790 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

fault all round with the politicians. He used to talk so 
loud, calling names to O'Brien, and 'his p;ick of loafers,' 
as he used to call them, that I take my oath youM liear 
him across the street. To shut his mouth, some of the 
gang, and I think Croker was one of them, went into his 
store and offered to put him on the General Committee, 
and that it would help him in business and other ways. 
He hunted them out of the store, calling them all the 
names he could think of. Then some of O'Brien's crowd 
were bent on shutting him up in another way. Larry 
Doolen and one of the crowd (I forget who the other was 
now) waited one night across the street until after O'Neil 
had closed his store and took his usual stroll. Thirty-sixth 
street, between Second and First avenue, in those days, was 
as dark as pitch at night, as the big yards and slaughter- 
houses that did business there were then closed. Whether 
O'Keil got wind of the job, or whether he spied Larry and 
the other fellow waiting across the street, I don't know ; 
but, at any rate, when he closes his store, what do you 
think my laddy-buck does but slip the big sharp knife that 
he used to cut cheeses with into his sleeve, and rambles up 
the avenue. And where do you think he turns to but 
Thirty-sixth street, the place of all the world that the other 
fellows wanted ! "Well, they followed him along the dark 
street, and at last came up to him ; but before they could 
grab liim, out with his knife came O'Neil and cut a big 
gash across Larry's stomach, who dropped down as if he 
was dead, and the other took to his heels like a rabbit ! 
Well," continued the Alderman, after he got through 
laughing, " Larry spent four months in hospital. He had 
a narrow escape, but he pulled through, and we were all 
glad of it, for there isn't a better fellow on earth ; but for 
many years afterwards the boys had fun with Larry about 
the way he did up O'Neil and how the groceryman cut his 
accpiaintance." 



SUCn IS TIIK GAME OF TOLITICS. W 

"Was there anv prosocutiou apjaiiist O'Neil for the 
ciittine:?'' 1 inquired. 

The" Ahlennan h)oked at me in astonishment, and an- 
swered : "Tiiat £jang never toUl tales out of school. But 
doesn't'it heat all," he added, " how things come ahout ^ 
There is Judge Barrett, after his awful chai-gc to the Jury, 
whieh came" near hanging Croker in IST-i, coming out 
twelve years after, and saying publicly that, from what he 
learned after, he knows that Croker was not gmlty. AV ho 
would think, when Judge B.arrett gave that charge, that 
twelve years after, when his term of otfice was expiring, 
Croker would be in command and have the power to say 
: whether Judi^e Barrett should he sent into private life or be 
kept on the Bench for fourteen years more ? To Croker's 
credit be it said that he forgave what he thought was 
\ a o-reat injury done him by Judge Barrett, and he 
o-ave him a renomination and election. Judge Barrett 
then did a nice thing for Croker by coming out and telling 
the public that Croker was not guilty of killing Jolin 
McKenna. It is a little curious that it took him all these 
years to say it, but such is the game of politics." 

"That was a senseless fight anyhow for Croker and 
O'Brien to be mixed up in ? '' I said. 

" You are right," replied the Alderman, " but, you must 

remember that there was very bad blood between them. 

I Croker was told that the O'Brien gang was throwing down 

boxes and raising Cain in the lower part of the district. 

Croker, with the two Ilickey brothers, Sheridan and others, 

went down in great fighting trim, and what made Croker 

angry, maybe worse than all, was when he saw one of his 

m^n, Jimmy McCartney, running away as if the very life 

was scared out of him. McCartney was inside one of 

Hewitt's election l)(;xes (a wooden box, the shape of a sentry 

box) and I think it was Billy Borst, or some other one of 

the O'Brien crowd, put his shoulder to McCartney's box 



793 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and threw it off the sidewalk into the street; when 
McCartney crawled out of the box, like a rat out of a tin 
can, and ran away like the wind, with the divil a soul 
behind him ; and Croker, seeing one of his men so cowardly, 
got up his temper, and he goes up to Borst and says : ' You 
get out of this district.' Borst says : ' What for ? ' and 
before another word passed Jimmy O'Brien comes up and 
says to Croker : ' You ungrateful cur, I picked you out of 
the gutter, and now you're supporting a rich man like 
Hewitt against me for Congress.' This was said in a loud 
voice by O'Brien, so as to shame Croker with the crowd, 
and he had it hardly out of liis mouth when all hands Avent 
at it hammer and tongs. In the mix-up McKenna got 
shot, and you know the rest." 

The unfortunate episode in which John McKenna lost 
his life, and for which Croker had to stand trial on 
the charge of murder, occurred on election day, I^ovember 
3, 1874. Two factions, one headed by O'Brien, and the 
other by Croker, came in contact at the corner of Thirty- 
fourth street and Second avenue, and during the affray 
which occurred, John McKenna, of the O'Brien faction, 
was shot. O'Brien and others accused Croker on the spot 
of having fired the shot, which in a few hours proved fatal. 
Croker was immediately arrested, and at the police station 
to which he was taken in the first instance, the charge that 
he was the murderer of McKenna was reiterated. At the 
inquest held on the body of McKenna, Croker was dis- 
charged by the Coroner, the verdict of the Coroner's Jury 
being to the effect that McKenna had been shot by a person 
unknown. Five days later Croker was indicted by the 
Grand Jury of the County, and put on trial for his life. 
The trial was sensational. John Kelly, who was then Boss, 
had unshaken faith in his innocence. Day by day he sat 
beside Croker at the Coroner's inquest and at the trial, 
giving advice and lending the force of his great influence 



now TWEED GOT RID OF A DISTURBER. r93 

and character to the Croker side ; for there were two »^idcs, 
in every sense of tlie word. It was regarded as unfortunate 
for Croker that his trial was brought before Judge (Tcorge 
C. Barrett, who, it was well known, could not be inlluenced 
by the Tammany politicians. As already related in a pre- 
ceding letter, it was this same Barrett who procured, or per- 
haps forced, from Judge Barnard the celebrated Foley in- 
junction, Whose far-reaching effect made the first break in 
the machinery of the Tweed Ring. 

In the Fall of 1871 Tweed threw out his political 
drag-net to haul within his grasp, for the purpose of 
crushing him, the strongest politician of the Apollo 
Hall faction, of which ex-Sheiiff .Tames O'Brien was 
the head and front. This person was Police Justice 
Thomas A. Led with, who, as I have stated in another 
letter, ran against A. Oakey Hall for Mayor the pre- 
ceding year, and who was so popular that, in spite of the 
great power of Tweed and his cohorts, he was, in the 
opinion of many, elected. But being elected was one 
thing, and obtaining the certificate of election was another ; 
and it goes without saying that, inasmuch as Tweed wanted 
Hall eiected, that settled all doubt upon that subject. But 
there was too much trouble about all this for Tweed, and 
for this reason lie regarded Ledwith as a sort of nuisance, 
and determined to either capture him or blot him out, and 
perhaps do both. So Tweed quietly sent his agent (of 
course in the guise of a mutual friend) to the weak-charac- 
tered Ledwith, and offered him the nomination for Supreme 
Court Judge. Tiie mutual friend pointed out to the 
popular but pusillanimous Ledwith that the game of politics 
shonld be played for what it is worth ; that he had now 
within his grasp a high office, with a salary of $17,500 a 
year for fourteen ycai-s ; tliat, of course, it was a foregone 
conclusion that, M'ith his ])ersonal popularity, and with the 
power of Tammany behind him, his election was assured. 



t94 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Ledwitli listened to the tempter, fell as did many before 
him, and the " Destroying Angel " gathered him in. Tweed's 
convention was held, and New York was startled by the 
nomination for Supreme Court Judge of Thomas A. Led- 
witli, the white robed idol of the opposition. 

Apollo Hall, thus sold out and betrayed, was now put 
upon its mettle. In opposition to Led with, it nominated 
George C. Barrett. Tweed, it was said, put up Ledwuth to 
be knocked down, and sent word along the line to slaughter 
him. He was slaughtered without mercy, both inside and 
outside of Tammany, and Barrett came forth triumphant. 

As to Ledwith, he never recovered from his disgrace. 
From the hour of his defeat he fell a victim to drink, and 
down he went step by step until he walked our streets 
almost a tramp, without money and without friends. He 
died a pauper. Barrett, on the other hand, rose to distinc- 
tion. He believed, and perhaps he believed correctly, that 
it was his own overwhelming popularity, and not public 
distrust of his rival, that secured his election, and he never 
gave the slightest token afterwards that he was thankful for 
his success to anybody but O'Brien, the Apollo Hall leaders 
and the independent citizens. 

This was the man sitting as Supreme Court Judge, two 
years later, before whom Richard Croker, a local Tammany 
politician, was placed on trial for the murder of John 
McKenna. Many witnesses testified. Croker strenuously 
denied that he had fired the fatal shot. There were, on the 
other hand, witnesses who testified that he did fire it. There 
were others who swore with equal positiveness that Croker 
did not fire the shot. Judge Barrett, in charging the Jury, 
among other things, said : 

" It is an undoubted fact that the very origin of the affair, the abso- 
lute commencement of it, all emanated from the prisoner himself ; that 
is, he, in company with the two Hickeys and Sheridan, met Borst aod 
Costello. He threatened Borst ; substantially told him to get out of the 
district. Now, that was the origin of the affair, and I am bound to say 



CROKER'S ACQl-ITTAL PUOM AN UNJUST CIIAKOE. tor) 

to you tliiil tli»> prisoiitT Irul id riiilit to take :niy such position as to 
Bor<t. It is an unilouhtcd I'act lluil Borsl and Coslcllo and the two 
O'Briens wore un.inncd." 

After deliberating seventeen lu)urs, tlic Jnry were unable 
to agree, and were discharged. The case was never brought 
uj> again. The general opinion to-day ia that Croker did 
not lire the fatal shot. 



LETTEE LXI. 

A Political Iago and his Treachery— Ties of Friendship 
Between Two Honorable Men Severed by a Moral As- 
sassin — Hatching a Nefarious Plot While Enjoying 
THE Hospitalities of His Victim — The Outcome op a 
Yachting Excursion — When Joseph J. O'Desdemona 
Was Slated for Mayor, and How Iago Turned John 
Othello Against Him — Secret Meeting of the Plot- 
ters — Iago's Uproarious Laughter as He Gloats over 
THE Details of His Shameless Infamy. 

My dear Dean : 

There lived not many years ago in the City of New 
York a certain man, whom I shall name John Othello. He 
was of humble origin ; his parents were poor, his early ad- 
vantages meagre, but nature had endowed him with a clear 
brain, a strong physique, an indomitable will and great 
moral stamina. Underneath a rough exterior he had a most 
kind and gentle heart. Early mixing in the politics of his 
native City, he grew up to power and popularity. He rose 
to high offices, the gift of his fellow-citizens, from the honest 
emoluments of which he realized considerable money. By 
careful investments in real estate in the City which had 
honored and helped him, he acquired a handsome compe- 
tence. But financial prosperity brought with it no fashion- 
able dissipation, no extravagant outlays, no vulgar displays. 
Realizing the defects of his early education, and desiring 
to keep [)ace as best he could with the good fortune which 
the confidence of his fellow citizens had brought him, and 
so as to properly represent the great community which had 
honored him, he brought into his house private tutors, and, 

79tj 



JOHN OTIIKLLO'S WEAK SPOT. 707 

altliouo-li tluMi advaiieiMl l)cvoii<l middle ago, he hravely set 
liimself to the iiohle task of acciuiring tlie education wliich 
the ill-fortunes of his earlv life had denied him. His tutors 
soon discovered that they were working on fertile soil. 
Within a eouple of years John Othello had advanced so 
rapidly in scholastic aecjuirements that he came forth 
from the hands of his tutors a fairly well-educated man. 
liela.xing nothing of his eagerness for knowledge, he 
continued not only to improve his mind by extensive read- 
ing, but also acquired a fair knowledge of the French and 
German languages. He was then a very happy man. 

But soon there came a change. One by one those near 
and dear to him had passed away. Not only was he afflicted 
by the death of a devoted wife, but all his children had 
died excepting one son, who grew to manhood, in whom he 
became wrapped up as the very idol of his soul. But, alas ! 
he, too, was doomed by the fatal disease of consumption, 
and a day came when the great, big heart of this strong, 
rugged man was broken, and he stood in his dreary home, 
alone and forlorn. From that time forth, he was a changed 
man. Religious always, he now became a devotee. What- 
ever there was of roughness in his nature became subdued 
and mollified. His sympathies went out towards distress 
with the softness of a woman. He abandoned political 
pursuits, and went abroad. His travels through foreign 
countries were in that simple and unpretentious manner 
which best typifies our highest ideal of an American 
citizen. 

When, after two years, he returned to his native city, he 
was called to the leadership of his party. He accepted that 
station altogether as a public duty. In the course of the 
political frictions and irritations incident to leadership, 
John Othello's early disposition after a while asserted it- 
self, and he became self-willed and unbendingly stubborn. 
His great weakness as a leader, however, was his credulity 



798 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

in the truthfulness and honor of some of the flatterers who 
surrounded his political throne. 

There was a certain man among the array of John 
Othello's courtiers, whom I shall call lago. This person 
had a great itch for public ofhce. lago would rather gatlier 
a few crumbs that fell fro.n the political table tlian go out 
and give his big frame to honest toil, to make an honest 
dollar. As a necessary accomplishment in the art of ac- 
quiring competence without labor, lago became greatly 
skilled in flattery and in pretenses to virtue and self-sacrific- 
ing friendship. It did not take long before John Othello 
was led to believe that this man lago was a person of truth, 
virtue and loyalty. 

And now I must leave John Othello and lago for a 
while, and talk of another man, who was made the victim 
of the political tragedy which I am about to relate. 

There lived at this time a rich merchant in our City, 
whose noble qualities and open-handed lilierality in every 
cause of distress and misfortune made his name respected 
and honored far and near. A man of great probity, self- 
repect and dignity, and extremely amiable and alfable 
withal, Joseph J. O'Desdemona early attracted the admira- 
tion and friendship of Jolm Othello. This friendship and 
admiration were more than reciprocated by O'Desdemona, 
and the respect and regard in which they held each other 
amounted almost to affection. 

And it came to pass that, early one Summer, a combina- 
tion of circumstances gave to John Othello, as the leader of 
his party, the absolute power to select the man who would 
be the Chief Magistrate of the Metropolis for the then 
ensuing two years, and his mind and his heart went out 
towards Joseph J. O'Desdemona for the exalted honor. 
But never a word did he utter to O'Desdemona himself, 
but he commissioned a trusty friend to delicately question 
O'Desdemona and ascertain whether, even at tlie sacrifice 



O'DESDEMONa overjoyed at lllj; 1>0LITICAL OUTLOOK. ?.»!) 

of hnsincss interests, he would accept tlie otlice were it 
olTered to liiin. 

In due time report was made to John Othello that 
O'Desdejttiona, with that unaffected frankness and candor 
Mhich formed so charmin<i^ a feature of his disposition, not 
only ex})ressed his willingness to accept, but added that to 
he the recipient of such an honor was the highest ambition 
of his life. Then John Othello was greatly overjoyed. 
Yet no promise had been made ; for wise leaders do not 
connnit themselves before it is necessary. Nor, when the 
two men met, was there even a word passed between them 
upon the subject. John Othello was w^iiting, with inward 
glee, for the day when he would give O'Desdemona a 
pleasant surprise. Yet, from various evidences, O'Des- 
demona now believed that John Othello favored him, and, 
burning with a worthy ambition for the high office, he 
thought ic j)rudent to ingratiate himself with the select 
coterie of district leaders who stood near the throne of 
John Othello. To accomplish this the more effectually, an 
invitation was extended by him to a half a score of these 
political princes to partake of his hospitalities on board his 
stately yacht, on a ten days' cruise, away from the intense 
heat of mid-summer. They accepted with alacrity; for, 
after the manner of mysteries, it leaked out among them 
that the trip meant a cruise with the next Mayor. And 
among the uierry party that set sail on an August morning 
was lago. 

IIow instinctively do some natures distrust each other! 
O'Desdemona was known to lago for some years, but the 
acquaintance was limited to casual conversations. Indeed, 
O'Desdemona knew lago only as one of the subordinates of 
the great John Othello, and therefore never noticed him 
much or treated him as a person of importance. During the 
cruise, the intelligence, the wit, and free and easy gaiety of 
the majoi'ity of hU guests made O'Desdemona very happy ; 



SOO THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

but, while as a host he was equally attentive and agreeable 
to all, there was some nndefinable reserve in his relations 
with lago. This was perhaps entirely the fault of lago. 
We are, in reality, after all, only slightly acquainted with 
the men we meet, talk with, and even dine witli from time 
to time, in our everyday lives. It is only when men are 
thrown closely together, for any great length of time, that 
they can see each other's characteristics. Good and bad 
qualities, generous dispositions and secret selfishness, moral 
beauties and moral blemishes, are all brought out and de- 
veloped by the closeness of association. During these ten 
days, it was evident that lago was not happy. He probably 
felt that he was dull and uninteresting, in comparison with 
the others, and that he was making but poor headway to- 
wards gaining the esteem of the man at whose hands he 
expected some high official position the following January. 
Up to the day of their return, lago could not free himself 
of the depressing feeling that he was no favorite of the 
prospective Mayor. 

Now the sequel : 

Among the district leaders, in those days, was one Col- 
onel Edward T. Sellers. The Colonel was a natural plot- 
ter, deep and tortuous. He was very practical in his no- 
tions of political ethics. He believed that a man who did 
not take care of himself in politics, no matter what hap- 
pened to anybody else, would never have a day's luck. At 
this time, there was no way by which the Colonel could 
reach a big public office but one, and that was to be closely 
allied with whoever would be the next Mayor ; for, although 
John Othello was Boss, still he never actually forced the 
appointment of persons who were positively objectionable 
to the appointing power. Now the Colonel had a brother- 
in-law, whose name was Francesco. Francesco was a man of 
prominence in the commercial world, and was what might 
be termed available timber for Mayor. Neither John 



lAGO DISCUSSING DIABOLICAL PLANS. SOI 

Otliollo nor any of the i)()liti('al prince-; wlio attended 
npon him knew Fi-anc*esco. Uiit the (\)lonul, bein^ full 
of devices, betliont^ht himself and souglit ont lago, and said 
to him (sulDStantially) : 

" laii^o, you arc without office; your purse is empty. 
Wherefore do you work so diHgently for the party? Great 
will be the patronage of the new Mayor, to be elected this 
Fall, and high are the offices he will have to bestow. How 
you shall fare in that shuffie is a matter that concerns me 
much, for I hold you in high esteem, lago." 

lago replied : " Your own purse, my dear Colonel, is as 
scant as mine. You are not in politics for your health, 
any more than I am. AVhere do you expect to come in ? ■' 

" Well," answered the Colonel, '• if Francesco was Mayor, 
both you and I would be right in it." 

'' Who is Francesco r' inquired lago. 

"Why," said the Colonel, "is it possible that you have 
not heard and read of Francesco, who is so high in the 
commercial world, who is a business man of the tirst water, 
and, my dear lago, what is more important than all, who is 
my brother-indaw." 

'' Is he a Democrat?" inquired lago, always pretending 
to be politically conscientious. 

" He is my brother-in-law, and that answers your ques- 
tion," proudly responded the Colonel. 

lago paused and pondered, seeing which the Colonel 
asked, eagerly : " But, let me ask you, lago, who has Othello 
in mind for the office ? " 

" In confidence I will tell you," said lago, '' that the man 
who is now slated in his mind, although he has not yet 
given it out, is Joseph J. O'Desdemona." 

"Horror of horrors!" exclaimed the Colonel; "what 
chance would men like you and I have at his hands ? 
Business men will fill the offices ; the public press will de- 
mand this. He is weak and will comply. Besides, his 



803 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

lofty notions will ignore men who do all the running about 
as we do, and, with him Mayor, you and I will have to sit 
down by the running waters and weep/' 

"I don't know what running waters you mean, whether 
it's the East river, or the North river," said lago ; " but, if 
I can manage it, it's the business men who will do the 
weeping," 

A conspiracy was then hatched, deep and damnable, 
lago planned it. O'Desdemona's character was to be 
broken down. He was to be morally assassinated. lago 
was to do it. With O'Desderaona out of the way, Fran- 
cesco had a clear field. Then^would come position and 
profit and plunder. 

John Othello hated immorality with the intensity of the 
most austere churchman. Show him that a man was not 
correct in his moral habits, and that man could receive 
no high station at his hands. This lago knew. The ten 
days' cruise was to be made the basis of the plot. That 
O'Desdemona was a generous host counted for nothing. 
No squeamish sentiment about hospitality, or the sacred 
rights that surround it, had any place in the " practical 
politics " of lago. 

The plot developed. Two more princes of the House of 
Othello were taken into the conspiracy. In case of emer- 
gency, lago must have support. At a club house near the 
centre of the City, the four met, two evenings prior to the 
nominating convention. lago was all prepared. He left 
them at eight o'clock ; went to the house of John Othello, 
and returned before ten. He had done the deed. So deftly, so 
adroitly did he unfold a fabricated tale of O'Desdemona's 
wrong-doing, during the ten days' cruise, that the astounded 
Othello believed him. You might ask why did not John 
Othello investigate ? How could he ? In what way could 
he approach the subject? Would he not be not only 
doubting the veracity of the pious and virtuous lago, but 



THE SUCCESS OF A MORAL ASSASSIN. 803 

1)0 breaking faitli witli liiiii, after lieliad told, in the utmost 
secrecy, what he preteiuled was painful for him to disehjso. 
and only did so because urijed by his sublime love for John 
Othelht, who had a rii2,ht to know the moral character of 
the man whom he was about to honor with the hi<i;hest 
office in his gift ? 

AVhen lago returned to his three confederates, and gave 
the story in detail — how he had, as he jocosely expressed it, 
'' worked the old man " — he put his hands deep in his 
trousers' pockets, leaned back in his chair, and laughed up- 
roariously ov^er his triumph. The ecstasy of the Colonel 
knew no bounds. He jumped to his feet and shaking lago 
by both hands exclaimed : " What a clever man you are ! " 

Thus were the ties of friendship between two honorable 
men torn asunder by the infamy of this moral assassin. 
John Othello was saddened as if some personal calamity had 
overtaken him. His former friend, as pure a Christian 
gentleman as ever New York produced, stood in his eyes 
as the very embodiment of hypocrisy. O'Desdemona, un- 
conscious of the foul stab of lago, regarded John Othello 
as insincei'o, callous and even treacherous. And so both 
men lived, viewing each other with aversion to the day 
of their death. 

lago triumphed, prospered, and holds his head very high 
to-dav. 



LETTEE LXII. 

Boss Croker's Audacious Admissions Before the Mazet 
Committee Dissected — Earnest Discussion by Four 
Well-known Club Men — A Conclave More Practical 
and Perhaps More Potential than an "Investigating 
Committee"— The Judiciary of New York City Humili- 
ated AND Degraded Before the World by Croker's 
Statement — Smothered Indignation of Bench and Bar 
AT his Insolence — Tweed Modest Compared with him — 
What New York Judges Should Do— Ex-Governor 
Hill's Personal Integrity Amidst Great Opportunities 
and Great Temptations— Vicissitudes of Rapid Tran- 
sit — A Public Necessity Made a Political Shuttle- 
cock — An Opinion Which Was No Opinion, But Which 
Cost Millions — Lucid Explanation op Its Far-Reach- 
ing Injury. 

My dear Dean : 

On the evening of April 26, 1899, four well-known 
men were seated at a table at one of the fashionable Clubs 
in this City, and I was the fifth member of the party. 
That very day Richard Croker sailed for Europe and the 
evening papers had given considerable space to the demon- 
stration attending his departure, which I have already 
described in a preceding letter. For obvious reasons I 
shall use fictitious names in referring to the four gentle- 
men whose conversations and discussions I am about to 
record, and the only purpose of recording them at all is 
to show the bent of public opinion on questions which 
go to the very foundation of our institutions, and which 
should arouse the attention and vigilance of every citizen 
in the metropolis. 

" Let me assure you, Judge," said Mr. Joseph Cremon, 

804 



CROKER DISCUSSED BY CLUB MEN. HOr, 

with irrcat di^jjuity, *' that wlit'ti I spoak of the ahsurdity of 
to day^s deiUDUstratioii, I am in no way i)iejudicod against 
Oroker, but my criticism is directs I to the fact that it was 
iutL'udeil as au a[)i>rjval of liis conduct and utterances before 
the Mazet Connnittee." 

Cremon, while addressiiiij^ tlieso remarks to Judij^e New- 
castle, evidently intended that they should not be lost on 
those present, for as he concluded he <j^lanced hastily fi'(^m 
one to the other. 

Joseph Cremon is a gentleman of high character in 
this comnumity, whose words are never lightly uttered. 
His experience of New York public life is varied and 
extensive. Besides, he has large interests in the City, being 
a man of great wealth in real estate and in stocks in various 
commercial and corporate enterprises. He might be 
epigraminatically described as a man of ability, respecta- 
bility and responsibility. 

James Newcastle is a Judge in this City of several years' 
standing, although still a young man. While he reached 
his present position by the aid of Tammany, he has never 
behaved as a sj'cophaut to the reigning Boss. 

The third of the party was Abraham Smaulhed, a lawyer 
about 40 years of age, who, for some unknown reason, is 
one of the keepers of King Croker's " conscience." He is a 
rapid and, it might be added, a vapid talker, who reaps, it 
is said, a rich harvest in references and other perquisites, 
the increments of political favoritism. 

The fourth of those present was Edmond Farwell, a 
retired merchant who does little else then nurse his large 
real estate interests and enjoy life after the manner of a 
sensil)le and hospitable gentleman. ^Ir. Farwell, although 
ordinarily silent, is a man who, when occasion requires, can 
express his views with force and pungency. 

Smaulhed was the first to reply to Cremon's observation, 
and asked, rather aggressively : " \Vhat is the matter with 



806 TITIRTT YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Mr. Croker's utterances and conduct before the Mazet 
Committee? I think everybody must admit he got the 
best of the situation." 

Cremon smiled, but said nothing just then. At length 
Judge Newcastle said : " I read the testimony of Croker 
and believe that in some particulars he was justified in not 
answering, but there were instances where he should have 
answered and waived all technicality, and that was where 
his boy was concerned. Here was a young man, who had 
scarcely attained his majority, swearing that his father gave 
him $19,000 to purchase an interest in a business concern 
and, being asked in what form lie received the money from 
his father, he swore his father gave him a check. Of 
course, if this were true, the check could be easily pro- 
duced, and if it were not true, the falsit}^ of his evidence 
could be as easily established. The boy leaves the 
stand and goes home, and that same da}' he hurries back to 
the Committee and attempts to correct his testimony by 
swearing that he received the $19,000 from his father in 
cash. Now, is it not impossible to believe that a father, 
desiring to put his son, a mere boy, into business, would 
give him so large a sum of money in cash ? But why in 
cash at all, if it were a legitimate transaction ? Is not a 
check the usual form in which such payments are made ? 
The mere fact of this departure from ordinary methods in 
itself covers the transaction with suspicion, I do not wish 
to be censorious where a boy's veracity under oath is con- 
cerned, but the inherent improbability of the whole story 
is very apparent. But, to add to the suspicion, Croker, 
when questioned as to this payment, positively refuses to 
answer on the grounds of this being ' private business.' 
Private business, where his own son's testimony could be 
relieved of a grave suspicion ? Oh, no ; it is plain that 
if the transaction were genuine, Croker would have been 
only too happy to answer." 



ADMISSIONS BEFORE MAZET COMMITTEE DISSECTED. sor 

" Well, suppose," said Sinaullied, '^ that Croker gave 
his son the check for $10,000, payable to bearer, and 
that the sou went to the bank and cashed it and tlien took 
the cash and ])aid it into the tirni, would not that account 
for youuij: Croker's testimony, tliat he <!jot a check from liis 
father, and would it not be consistent also with his 
evidence that he paid it to the firm in cash?" 

" If that is the best defence you can make," replied 
Judge Newcastle, "■ it is very unfortunate for Croker and 
his son ; because the son swore the second time he went on 
the stand, not that he paid the money to the firm in 
cash, but that he received it from his father in cash. But 
waiving this altogether, let me ask you, if the transaction 
was as you say, why did not Croker produce from the 
bank the check he gave his son and end the matter ? You 
will admit that it is difficult to believe that there was any 
money paid into the firm for the interest which Croker 
acquired ?" said the Judge, looking sharply at Smaulhed. 
Before the latter could answer, Farwell interjected : 

"Now, Judge, fair play. Mr. Smaulhed can't be a 
good Tammany Hall man unless he does believe it." 

This, coming from the sedate Farwell, created laughter, 
and Smaulhed had sense enough to take advantage of the 
merriment to abandon an argument in which he was at 
so great a disadvantage. 

"It was not to this nnfortunate transaction I referred 
when I spoke of Croker's testimony," said Cremon, calmly, 
" It was to another subject of far greater consequence 
to the people of New York." 

" Yes," said Judge Newcastle, " I think I know what 
you mean. You doubtless refer to his testimony where he 
states that, as leader, he is for his own pocket every day in 
the week." 

"Why shouldn't he?" broke in Smaulhed. "If he 
doesn't take care of himself, who will ? Isn't this what 



808 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK PC, .TICS. 

everybody does ? " and as he said this he looked inquiringly 
at Farwell, whom he evidently expected to coincide with 
him in this philanthropic view of Croker's grabbing 
propensities. But he was sorry that he made this silent 
aj)peal before Farwell was half through with his answer. 

" I have never been much of a politician," began Mr. 
Farwell, modestly, " but I have always supported the 
Democratic party. I have done so because I believed 
in its principles. To be the leader of the Democratic 
party of this great City is a proud position. You will 
pardon me, Judge, when I say that it is in some regards 
even a more honorable position than a' seat upon the 
Judicial Bench. The leader, if he is a man of honor, 
can do great service in this community. Upon him de- 
pends the question whether or not we have good or bad 
public officials, including not only the Mayor of the City 
but the Judges who preside over our Courts. This is a 
great trust which should never be placed in the hands 
of any man unless he is the soul of honor. It is most 
degrading to us to have it said that the leader of the New 
York Democrats holds his position to make merchandise 
out of it. But doubly degrading and humiliating is it for 
us when that leader, under oath, before a Committee 
of our State Legislature, in the presence and hearing, so to 
speak, of the whole State, and I might say of the whole 
world, declares, after the manner of a common scullion, 
that his leadership is a sort of business, and that he 
was there for his pocket every day in the week, or 
words to that effect. I have no personal feeling against 
Croker. On the contrary, I confess I am under some 
trifling obligations to him, but, being under a hundi-ed 
times greater obligations has nothing whatever to with the 
shameful position in which he has placed every self- 
respecting Democrat in this City. How can we hold up 
our heads in State or National Conventions when our 



DEFE. )EU OF THE BOSS IN A CORNER. 809 

leader swears substantially that the hii,diest motive of his 
leadership is to gather in money without doing any work 
for it ? My position is this." continued Ftirwell ; "■ let 
Croker make away with all his millions. I won't inquire 
even where or how he got them. But, for Heaven's sake, 
let him get out of our way and out of our sight ! " 

This onslaught, which Farwell delivered almost vehe- 
mently, caused a profound impression, and a brief si- 
lence ensued. Smaulhed looked angry, and pointing his 
forefinger at Farwell, asked rapidly, and without the 
slightest pause, the following questions : " Is not Croker as 
good as Tom Piatt? Are not all Bosses alike? Don't 
they all get rich ? ]\[ustn't you have a leader ? Whaf s 
the use in talking? What are organizations for? What is 
your grievance anyhow ? " 

Farwell, looking solemnly at Smaulhed, said: "If your 
only defence of Croker is that he is as good as Tom Piatt, 
it is a very poor one. Tom Piatt does not own New York, 
never did and never can, for he represents a hopeless min- 
ority of our citizens. But while I know that some of the 
people around Piatt are as bad as can be produced, yet it 
never has been proven, or even stated, that Piatt him- 
self, while a great evil in politics, made himself rich out of 
his political opportunities. He certainly has not jumped 
from comparative poverty to be worth millions in a few 
short years, nor is he without a visible means of making a 
livelihood. How long do you think would Piatt last in 
his control of the Kepublican party, if he went on the wit- 
ness-stand and swore that as leader he was working for his 
own pocket every day in the week ? The balance of your 
questions, Mr. Smaulhed, it seems to me, need not be 
answered." 

Then I suggested that perhaps the discussion did not 
cover the particular part of Croker's testimony referred to 
a while ago by Mr. Creuion, when he said that there was 



810 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

'"' another subject of far greater consequence to the people of 
New York," and I looked at Cremon, inquisitively. 

" I am a little astonished," said Cremon, " that Judge 
Newcastle, who states that he read Croker's testimony, 
should have confined his criticisms to two features of it, 
degrading enough for us Democrats to contemplate, and 
omit speaking of that part of the testimony which has 
startled all thoughtful men. Perhaps Judge Newcastle 
refrained from commenting upon it, because his own status 
as a Judge is somewhat involved in it. In the Tweed days, 
that which most agitated thinking men, and in fact all 
men, was the consciousness that the Judiciary of New York 
was subservient to the Tammany Ring. The citizens 
might look with a certain degree of forbearance upon other 
official wrong-doing, but to be cursed with corrupt or even 
subservient Judges, was a disgrace which could never be 
tolerated. Yet, after all these years, after our supposed 
advancement, this man Croker, wholly without shame, 
swears that Judges of our City are expected, because they 
were nominated by him, to comply with his demands in 
their Judicial functions, and he actually admitted on the 
witness-stand that he refused a nomination to Judge Jos- 
eph P. Daly because that independent and upright Judge 
declined to comply with his demands in the exercise of 
his public duties. Tweed, with all his recklessness, had 
too much sagacity to give utterance to such audacity. 
Now what is the eifect of this testimony? It not only 
impairs the dignity, not to say any more, of the Bench 
in our own City and country, but throughout Europe. 
Suppose, Judge Newcastle, that you went to London and 
were introduced to an English Judge in that City as one 
of the New York City Judges, what respect could he en- 
tertain for you, if he believed you were a dummy Judge 
nominated and elected for the main purpose of serving 
Croker and Tammany Hall ? What must lawyers every- 



HUMILIATION" OV THE .H Dlt lAKY KXCITES IXDKiNATIOX. 811 

where think of our Jiulges, in the face of Croker's testi- 
mony i Yet there are Judges, notwitlistiinding liis insult, 
who, even since lie testitied, have attended upon him, and 
indeed fawned u])on him, at the Democratic Cluh, night 
lifter night. If Croker were one of the best men that ever 
lived, this assault upon the honor of the Judiciary should 
drive him at once out of the position he degrades.'' 

'' Perhaps those Judges,'' broke in Farwell, slily, " arc 
looking for a renomination or something like that." 

" Yes," replied Cremon, " but there are Judges who 
are not looking for a renomination, for they have yet a 
long term to serve, who pay these visits and pocket the 
insult they have received." 

'' I have heard this commented upon and I know all that 
you say, Mr. Cremon, is true," said Judge Newcastle, " but 
some of these Judges who go there do so for the purpose 
of aiding the Judge or Judges who are seeking renomina- 
tion. You know a great friendship exists between Judges 
who have been long and closely associated with each other 
on the Bench, and they try to help each other along." 

'' I don't see any harm in Judges going to the Demo- 
cratic Club," said Sraaulhed, enthusiastically ; " everybody 
of any account goes there, and why shouldn't Judges?" 

" Because," said Cremon, '• it gives corroboration to 
Croker's testimony that he expects compliance with his 
demands from every Judge he nominates." 

" Well," I said, '' it is lucky for Croker that I am not a 
Supreme Court Judge." 

" What would or could you do ? " asked Judge Newcastle, 
with a ])enetrating look. 

"I know," I re])lied, •' that there are many sensitive gen- 
tlemen on the Bench in this City, who if some one Judge 
took action, would be glad to resent the insult to the Judi- 
ciary. Now you ask me what I would do if I had the 
honor of occupving that exalted station? I would do 



812 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

this: Write a statement of tlie matter to eacli of my 
brother Judges, and point out the . degraded position in 
which Croker has placed the Judiciary ; that not merely to 
maintain their own dignity, but what was of far greater 
moment and deeper significance, to preserve unsullied 
among the people the honor and independence of the 
Bench of this City, of which our Judges are the custodians, 
it behooves them to resent any attempt or declaration which 
tended to lessen the reverence of the people for Judicial 
authority, and to that end I would ask them to meet and 
make some formal pronouncement in condemnation of 
Croker's audacious assumption." 

" Do you think, " replied Judge Newcastle, " that it would 
be dignified for the New York Judiciary to notice every 
idle statement made concerning it ? " 

"This was not an idle statement," I answered; " it was 
made under the solemnity of an oath. It was made more- 
over by a public man who holds New York in the palm of 
his hand, and whose words were published in almost every 
quarter of the globe, tending to make again the name of 
the New York Judiciary, as was said of it in the days of 
Tweed, ' a hissing and a byword throughout the world.' Can 
the world do otherwise than believe his sworn statements 
while they remain unchallenged ? " 

" It seems to me," said Cremon, "although I am not a 
lawyer, that the members of the New York Bar should 
resent it, as it reflects on the tribunal before which they 
practice. You will recollect that it was the lawyers who 
inaugurated the great movement in Tweed's time to vindi- 
cate the honor and integrity of the Bench. Why should 
they not now take action on the insult offered to the 
Judiciary ? " 

" I am inclined to think," replied Judge Newcastle, '' that 
the Bench, rather than the Bar, should take the initiative in 
this instance. In the Tweed days to which Mr. Cremou 



WHAT NEW YORK JUD(iF,3 SlloCl.l) DO. 813 

refers, the lawyers rose up ajjjainst the corrupt Judges. The 
situation now is (piite (lillVreut. There is no pretence to- 
day that the Judges of this City are pecuniarily corrupt, 
however uuicli may be said of the political subserviency of 
some of them. In fact, the suggestion here is, tliat the 
Judges resent, by some formal declaration, the insult tlie 
Judiciary of this City has received by certain sworn state- 
ments of Richard Croker on the witness-stand." 

" If our Judges acting in a body did this." said Farwell, 
'• they would honor themselves and honor the ]>eople who 
elected them. Besides, such action would stand forth for 
all time as a warning to future Bosses. I would like to see 
it done and '■ — 

" And that you will never see done," interrupted Smaul- 
hed. "That you may rely upon. You must remember 
there are leaders of the Bench as well as of the Bar." 

At this observation, Judge Newcastle looked at Smaulhed 
and flushed a little, but said nothing. 

*^ You don't mean to say we have a Boss Judge ? " asked 
Farwell. 

" No, I don't mean to say that," said Smaulhed, somewhat 
embarrassed. 

"•Then what do you mean?" inquired Judge Newcastle. 
"What I mean is,'' said Smaulhed, slowly, "that when 
it comes to taking steps such as suggested tliere are 
some Judges whose long experience and good judgment 
would advise against it, and that this would have influence 
^vith the other Judges, who perhaps might be impulsive." 

At this point there was a pause in the conversation, 
during which each one of those present seemed to be com- 
muning with himself. Altogether, it was not an agreeable 
evening for Smaulhed, considering his relations to the 
inner circle in Democratic politics, and he was so over- 
mastered in mental force, by at least three of his com- 
panions, that he lost the obtrusive volubility which char- 



814 THIRTY YEARS OT* NEW YORK POLITICS. 

acterized his conversation at the start. More than this, 
he was apparently approaching a back-down from his orig- 
inal attitude ; for he said, in a half-pleading tone : 

" While I am a Tammany Hall man, I do not want it 
understood that I sanction wrong-doing in the management 
of the organization, or in anything else. I am for the honor 
of the Bench above everything. I think myself that 
Croker might have done a good deal better on the witness- 
stand before the Mazet Committee, and, in fact, I told him 
afterwards that he ought to go and correct the testimony 
in regard to the Judges, as it gave a bad impression as it 
stood, and was bound to hurt him and the organization. 
Now, I suggested, for instance," ran on Smauihed, at a 
great pace, " that he should say to the Committee that he 
never asks anything from Judges relating to decisions of 
cases and all that, and if they occasionally did him and 
his friends favors, it was only a kindly act on their part 
for what he did for them ; that neither before nor after 
nominations did he make a bargain with them, or with any 
of them, and that as far as Judge Daly was concerned, he 
was long enough on the Bench, 28 years, and this ought to 
satisfy any one man, especially when other good men, who 
never got anything, wanted the place." 

" What did Croker say to that very wise suggestion ? " 
Farwell asked, smiling. 

" What did he say ? " said Smauihed, impulsively. " Well, 
I'll tell you what he said. We were standing face to face 
in the Democratic Club. Croker had a cigar in his mouth 
and both hands in his trousers pockets, and he kept looking 
at me while I was giving this advice, and before I had 
entirely finished, he turned his back abruptly and walked 
away." 

" I'm afraid you won't get many more references," said 
Farwell. 

Cremon and Judge Newcastle chuckled. 



SMAULIIED BADLY ^HXED UP. 815 

"Oh, well. I don't care about tliat,'' explained Sniaullicd. 
with great rapidity. '' I have now a hii; law i»raetice and 
don't care about them ; but it is not that ; it is the funny 
way Croker took it." 

'' I don't think it was funny ; that is not Croker's style 
of humor," said Farwell. " Indeed," he continued, '' I am 
not so much concerned about your getting references, but 
some time ago I tliink you told me that you were slated by 
Croker for Supreme Court Judge." 

''Well," said Smaulhed, "there was talk about that 
several months ago ; but I think Judge Barrett has got in 
his fine work on Croker; and then, there's Whalen." 

" A few moments ago," said Cremon, addressing Smaul- 
hed, " you stated that Judge Daly was long enough on the 
bench, and urged that fact as a justification for Croker's 
retiring him. Now you say Croker favors continuing 
Judge Barrett, who has been 34: years on the bench, not to 
speak of the six years he had been District Court Judge." 

" Oh, well," stammered Smaulhed, badly mixed up, " you 
know circumstances alter cases." 

" Do you mean to imply," said Cremon, warmly, " that it 
would have been better for Judge Daly had he tried 
Croker for murder, as Judge Barrett did ; but instead of 
Judge Barrett being accused of favoring Croker, it is said 
that his charge to the Jury was very severe." 

" Croker was not guilty of that charge, and what is 
more, he was never known to even carry a pistol," said 
Smaulhed, with great vigor. 

"No one now believes that he fired the fatal shot," 
answered Cremon, coolly. 

This concession to Croker's goodness gave new courage 
to Smaulhed, who now launched forth into a panegyric of 
Croker, in the course of which he alleged that Croker was 
the greatest leader Tammany ever had ; that after making 
juen politically and putting large sums of money in their 



816 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

way, he met witli ingratitude from them, (giving a side 
glance at Cremon,) but that now he had rid himself of the 
deadweights, and retired several conspirators, Gilroy, Martin, 
Bourke Cockran^ Purroy and others ; and then, without any 
apparent provocation, he denounced David B. Hill and 
declared that " Croker will down him before he gets 
through with him." 

" I have never been a great admirer of Hill," said Judge 
Newcastle ; " but as between Hill and Croker there certainly 
can be no comparison. Hill has large, comprehensive 
views on public questions, was able to hold his own among 
the best of them in the United States Senate, and has shown 
himself qualified to grasp problems of which Croker has 
not even the slightest understanding." 

" While I have not always agreed with Hill in his 
methods of party management," said Cremon, " and believe 
that he deserved the condemnation he received in the 
Maynard affair and in other matters, yet his personal 
integrity, in the midst of great opportunities, and perhaps 
great temptations, entitles him to the respect of every honest 
man." 

" But look at his vacillating attitude in the Bryan cam- 
paign," urged Smaulhed ; " when every man declared him- 
self on one side or the other, Hill hid himself from view 
and skulked away from the battle." 

" Now let us be fair about that," said Judge Newcastle. 
"Hill was in this position: he could not endorse the 
Chicago platform on the one hand, and on the other, as a 
Democratic leader, he could not openly declare war against 
the action of his party, in a Convention regularly called 
and fairly conducted, as the Chicago Convention was 
admitted on all sides to have been. What was he to do 
under such circumstances ? I was and am still strongly 
opposed to the financial heresy of that platform, but now, 
looking back, after the smoke of battle has cleared away, I 



Judge NEWCASTLE'S DEFENCE OF EX-GOVERNOU IIIF.L. Sit 

think Hill's position was diffoivnt from that of an ordinary 
Democrat. He was the Democratic leader of this <i;reat 
State, and doubtless felt that, as one of the cardinal princi- 
ples of Democracy is the right of rule by the majority, and 
ill the absence of any charge of fraud, or even unfairness, 
he could not, without absolute stultilication, openly de- 
nounce tljc deliberate action of the Convention, or publicly 
repudiate its chosen candidate. Hence it was that he 
received William J. Bryan, the Democratic candidate, at 
his home iu Albany. 1 am inclined to think, after all, con- 
sidering his position as leader, that he i)ursue(l tlie logical 
course." 

This commentary seemed, for a time at least, to have 
silenced Smaulhed, but Farwell, looking mischievously at 
him, asked : " Where was your friend Croker during 
that campaign ? " 

Smaulhed tossed his head and laughed, but made no 
answer; whereupon Farwell continued : " He was grooming 
his horses on the English race-track, while Hill was at home 
grooming the Democracy for future sweepstakes." 

Then I made this observation: "In reference to Hill, I 
desire to say a word. A few months ago, while attending 
at the Court of Appeals in Albany, a condition arose where 
I had to employ associate counsel in a case in which I was 
interested, and knowing that Hill was practicing law in 
Albany, I went to his office to retain him. I found him 
occupying modest offices consisting of two rooms plainly 
furnished. Giving him a retainer of $100, he forthwith 
took my case in hand at the Court of Appeals. As matters 
turned out, the service he was called upon to render did 
not involve much professional work, but he attended to it 
with the same alacrity as if he had just been starting out in 
his profession. My object in referring to this matter is for 
the pui-pose of asking you to reflect upon these facts : That 
Hill had been seven years Governor of the State of New 



818 I'HIRTY TEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

York ; that lie had been six jea.rs Uinted States Senator ; 
that in these high public stations he was not only diligent 
but hardworking; that he was free from extravagance of 
any kind ; that he had no race-horses and no retinue ; but 
that his entire career was that of a careful, prudent and 
cautious man. Of the seven years in which he was 
Governor, there were years in any one of which, had he 
been corrupt, or had he made surreptitious combinations, 
he could have realized a million dollars. After all these 
thirteen years of service, as Governor and United States 
Senator, we find him a comparatively poor man, eking out 
a modest living in practicing his profession in the City of 
Albany. In view of the vast wealth of others, who had 
not the one-hundredth part of his opportunities and tempta- 
tions, is not this an agreeable spectacle and object lesson for 
the Democrats of this State ? " 

"While no man should get special credit because of the 
fact that he is honest," said Cremon, " every Democrat 
ought to have a certain pride for their chosen public 
officer, who, amidst conditions which surrounded Hill, kept 
his honor above reproach. Hill was so careful that he 
seems to have kept himself free even from speculations of 
any kind while he was Governor. It was undoubtedly easy 
for him to make a great deal of money by a small or a nom- 
inal investment, had he only permitted himself to be used, 
or even to remain passive. Taking this view of Hill, he 
must have our respect ; for," continued Cremon, " what is 
the use of talking of public virtue, and of setting examples 
to our children and the rising generation, if, in our treat- 
ment of public men, we ignore distinctions between con- 
spicuous honesty and conspicuous rascality ? " 

" But Hill is cold and austere in manner, and does not 
treat people with the warmth necessary for a successful 
leader," said Smaulhed. 

" If getting warm means stealing public money," chimed 



AN UNFORTUNATE OFFICIAL DECISION. «!» 

in Farwell, " then may the Lord keep him coM until the 
day of his death.'' 

"And then r' said Smaullied, hvnghing. 

"And then," responded Farwell, " U't him have a warm 
corner in Heaven." 

This restored good liumor, and the conversation took a 
new turn to Eapid Transit, the Municipal Debt and the 
tying-np of City contracts. 

" Nothing coukl be more criminal," said Cremon, " than 
the conduct of the present City Administration in its elastic 
decisions relating to the INIunieipal indel)tedness. If the 
people of New York had full knowledge of the injury done 
them, and understood the real cause of it, they would rise up 
in anger just as they did at the disclosure of the Tweed Ring 
frauds in 1 871. But fortunately for the present Adminis- 
tration the people do not understand it. Yet the robberies 
of the City Treasury by Tweed and his accomplices were 
not half as injurious to the public as the evils which have 
resulted from the action of the City authorities, in not only 
impairing the credit of the City and tying up unlaw- 
fully for several months necessary public improvements, 
but in giving a serious set-back to the project of Rapid 
Transit." 

" Well, Mr. Cremon," said Smaullied, " didn't the Cor- 
poration Counsel hasten to change his opinion as soon as 
he discovered that his first opinion was wrong?" 

" It is true that he took back his first opinion," replied 
Cremon, " but I don't recollect that he was in great haste 
about it." 

"Well, then, where was all the injury done that you 
speak of ? " argued Smaullied. 

" The injury I admit is not very apparent at a superficial 
glance," answered Cremon, " and this is the reason wliy 
there is so little indignation on the subject ; but, as I before 
stated, if the effect and extent of the wrong were univer- 



820 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

sally understood, there would be quite a commotion in New 
York." 

"I would like to hear the matter explained," said Far- 
well, " and especially by Mr. Cremon, who has had such 
experience in public matters." 

"■ It would require a somewhat lengthy explanation to 
understand it thoroughly," said Cremon. 

'' I am sure it will be quite interesting to us," urged 
Judge Newcastle. 

" The Elevated Railroad," began Cremon, " has been for 
years an important factor in the politics of this City. 
Several men of political influence were induced to buy 
stock in it and speculate on its rise and fall. It goes 
without saying, that the construction of a Rapid Transit rail- 
road would tumble down the Elevated stock. Therefore it is 
clearly in the interest of the holders of this stock to defeat the 
project of Rapid Transit. Now, as the saying is, stick a pin 
there ; for this is the point to be kept constantly in view. 
Rapid Transit agitation has been the sport and profit of 
politicians for many years back, as it is to-day. Some few 
years ago, the public were led to believe that tliey were 
going to be blessed with it at last. A public letting was 
advertised for the work of construction in sections. Up 
to the very day of the letting the public at large had con- 
fidence that an actual start on the enterprise was at hand. 
But the manipulators of Manhattan stock knew better — in 
fact, they were well aware that it was going to be a fiasco. 
Why? Because the conditions put into the contract and 
specifications were sucli that no contractor outside of a 
lunatic asylum would l)id for the work. When the official 
auctioneer appeared at the City Hall on the day specified in 
the public notice there were of course no bidders, but the few 
persons present had a sort of a mock auction and some 
fun. The Elevated railroad people enjoyed the joke. 
Rapid Transit was given a black eye for a season. Some- 



now THE CITY WAS HANDICAPPED. S2t 

%vliat similar jui!;i::lin^ was gone througli with more re- 
cently; but just at the time when, iu spite of many 
obstacles, the project was at length assuming a business-like 
shape, and the speedy commencement of the work was 
in sight, the City authorities unfortunately concluded 
not only that the City debt limit had been reached, 
but that it had been unlawfully exceeded by nearly 
$20,000,000. 

"What do you think this conclusion was founded on?" 
continued Crenion. " It was based chiefly upon the propo- 
sition that the millions of dollars which the City has put 
iu the Sinking Fund do not really belong to the City at 
all. The legal opinion, of course, did not put it exactly in 
this way, but boiling down all the verbiage and sophistry 
and nonsense, the essence of the opinion was this : if you 
put money in a bank for future contingencies or emer- 
gencies, that because you did so, the money no longer 
belongs to you although it is not claimed that it belongs to 
anybody else. 

" But there were other grounds upon which the City's 
alleged impecuniosity was based, and whether they are more 
profound than the one already stated, you must be the 
judge. By the aid of a large number of words, the proposi- 
tion was sought to be established, that a man may now be 
actually in debt for some prospective indebtedness. Under 
this logic it was decided that the City's present debt was 
heavily increased because the Legislature provided that 
the City may or shall construct certain bridges, and certain 
great highways, and other public works, in the future, and 
for these purposes it shall, when the time comes, issue bonds 
from time to time as the money may be needed, and 
although it may take many years to complete the work, 
the City, it was held, was now already actually in debt for 
the whole cost of the construction. 

" This is the way our City was handicapped, and this is 



832 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

how it was argued that its indebtedness was nearly $20,000,- 
000 in excess of the constitutional debt limit. It therefore 
followed as a consequence that it was not lawful for the City 
to issue any more bonds or incur any more indebtedness. 
Thus the bonds authorized to be issued for Rapid Transit 
were hung up, and once again the holders of Manhat- 
tan stock were happy. 

" Kow," added Cremon, " what was the effect of this 
profound decision outside and beyond the temporary strang- 
ling of Rapid Transit ? If you reflect, you will find other 
grave consequences. To begin with, there was a scare 
as to the validity of all bonds alleged to be issued in ex- 
cess of the constitutional debt limit, thus indirectly do- 
ing great injury to the City. But there was worse than 
this. 1^0 more bonds being issued, no further contracts 
for public improvements could be authorized, while the va- 
lidity of many existing contracts was regarded as imperilled. 
And to follow the evil results still further, the Comptroller 
was unable to 23ay City contractors the instalments provided 
in the contracts, and these payments being one of the es- 
sentials of the agreement with the City, the contractors 
had no recourse but to suspend their work, while some of 
them threw up their contracts altogether and commenced 
suits for damages against the City. Nor are these the 
only suits against the City arising out of these complica- 
tions ; for all the contractors whose works were suspended 
during a period of four months are making prepara- 
tions to sue the City for damages. The aggregate amount 
of all these claims will reach, I am told, over $2,000,000. 
Then look at the heartless cruelty of the whole affair. 
The payments to contractors being suspended, all their 
workmen had to be laid off during these several months. 
The small traders, the grocer, the butcher, and so forth, 
with whom the workingmen dealt, were also out and 
injured; and all this because the people's money was tied 



THE INCAI.CL'LARLE INJURY SUSTAINED. S33 

ui) under tlio operation of ^-lai-iugly alt>iir<l law opinions. 
Perhaps, however, the most injurious result of all was that 
it stopped the completion of new j)ul)lic schools while 
thousands of our children roamed the streets for want of 
accommodation. I have had always a hii;h rei!;ard for 
Mr. Whalen, and do not believe he would willin<i;ly con- 
sent to have the (\>rporation Counsel's oilice used for 
unworthy purposes. But the fact remains that his opin- 
ion was so transparently erroneous that he reversed him- 
self, but not until, as I have shown, untold iinancial and 
other injuries had been done." 

Then Cremon, in conclusion, said, impressively : "Review- 
ing and estimating the injury done directly and indirectly 
to the City; in the retarding of improvements beneficial 
to real estate and essential to the comfort and health of the 
community ; in the unjustifiable reflection on the fair name 
of the City, tending to impair its credit throughout the 
world ; in the damages it will have to pay to City con- 
tractors ; it is hardly an exaggeration to say that the public 
interests have been injured to the extent of $10,000,000. 
If you add to these injuries that of giving a set-back to 
Rapid Transit, you simply run into incalculable amounts." 

During this recital all present listened with wrapt atten- 
tion, and when Cremon finished, Judge Newcastle with 
emphasis, said : " This is monstrous. I never looked upon 
the matter in this way before. You are right, Mr. Cremon, 
in saying that if every citizen of New York knew the real 
facts, it would create, and justly so, a great uproar." 

" You have not said anything about the Traction Com- 
panies ? " said Farwell, looking at Cremon. " I believe 
there are a few politicians in that concern. Would not 
Rapid Transit affect that stock also ? " 

" I suppose it would," replied Cremon. 

" Who are the fellows that got the benefit of the o])inion ? " 
asked Farwell, with an innocent air. 



824 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

"I have not said that anyone was benefitted; I simply 
stated the facts," replied Cremon. 

•' Where was Mayor Van Wyck during these four 
months ? " asked Farwell. " lie was Chief Justice of the 
City Court for some years, and ought to have been able to 
see at a glance that Mr. Whalen's opinion was not sound ? " 

No one answered. 

Then Farwell, with a half smile, gave a keen glance at 
Smaulhed and said : " You were very close to Croker, 
— barring the night he walked away from you — now, do you 
know whether Croker wrote any opinion on the debt limit ? " 

This created considerable laughter, and Farwell called 
for more refreshments. 



LETTER LXIII. 

Trickery and Chicanery of Machine Politics— Ostensible 
Foes Combine for Sinister Purposes — Revelation of 
AN Ingenious Device to Undo a Candidate for Mayor 
— Cunning Scheme to Gain Press Favor— Influence 
OF Corporate Monopolies on Mayoralty Nominations 
— How Boss Platt was Hoodwinked — The Job that 
Was "Put Up" on Seth Low— A "Destroying Angel" 
Comes to the Front — Phenomenal Canvass Against the 
Combined Machines — Object Lesson for Independent 
Voters. 

My dear Dean : 

Several doctrinaires and writers on tlie government of 
cities have propounded a variety of processes wliereby the 
rule of Rings and Bosses may be circumvented if not 
obliterated. In these disquisitions the process of " Direct 
Legislation " seems to be most urgently adv^anced as a cure 
for the disease. The proposed process embodies the follow- 
ing scheme for city governments : — 

1. The Initiative ; that is, a method by which a certain 
percentage of the voters may of their own accord, by sign- 
ing a petition, cause a given subject to be referred for 
decision to the popular vote, such decision to be final 
without the indorsement of the Municipal Council or 
Mayor. 

2. The Referendum ; which provides for the referring 
of questions of popular interest to a direct vote of the 
people for acceptance or rejection. 

3. The Recall ; by which a majority of voters may recall 
any public official who is unfaithful to his duties. 

It seems unnecessary to discuss these propositions as a 
remedy for the evils under which New York is groaning. 

825 



S26 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Besides, looking for new remedies is a tacit admission tliat 
the present governmental macliinerj, founded upon uni- 
versal suffrage, is not efficacious in grappling Avitli the 
j)roblera. So far from subscribing to any such admission, 
I hold, on the contrary, that a free ballot, as has been 
abundantly proven in numerous instances in the course of 
our history, is all-sufficient to accomplish the destruction of 
Rings and Bosses. The experiments above referred to 
may be tried with success in smaller communities, but it 
would be idle to attempt to apply them to the complications 
incidental to the political conditions of New York. Why ? 
Let me explain. 

The City of l^ew Tork is divided into two great local 
political camps, which are ostensibly hostile, but for the 
most part and in a certain sense friendly. Each is con- 
ducted under certain rules and regulations, committees and 
sub-committees, which in their collective capacity constitute 
the Machine. In control of each Machine is a Boss, and a 
certain number of Deputy Bosses, of greater or less degree 
of power, according to the value of each as a political or 
financial agent of the Boss-in-Chief . These Machine Bosses, 
great and small, have no idea of being in politics except for 
the purpose of obtaining office either for themselves or 
their immediate followers, and getting money directly or 
indirectly out of the City Treasury. This has been the 
condition of New York from the early days of Tweed, ex- 
cepting that in his time, as explained in a former letter, the 
direct method of public plunder was in vogue, while the 
approved system of modern times is the indirect method, 
because in the first place it is the safer, and in the next 
place more money can be aljstracted from the pockets of 
the people without their noticing it. These two camps of 
Machine politicians — the Tammany and the Republican — 
make a great public noise in denouncing each other, but 
this is done, in most cases, with a view of throwing sand in 



SECRET ALLIANCES OF BOSSES. 82? 

the people's eyes and their antagonisms at the worst are 
only limited. For instance : if Tammany in an approach 
inij^ election sees no opposition except the T^epublican 
in'ganization, then it talks out bravely, loudly proclaiming 
that it will make no compromise Avith the enemy, and that 
it recpiires no assistance from any outside source, but will 
•*go it alone." Prior to the late Constitutional amendment 
of 1 897, separating National and State from City elections, 
and in years when a Presidential or Gubernatorial election 
took ]ilace, Tammany could, as the saying is, nominate '' a 
yellow dog " or '' a wooden Indian " and elect it to any 
office in the City government. On such occasions Tam- 
many would appeal to the patriotism of all Democrats, and 
call upon them, by all that was sacred, to stand firmly by 
their party, to uphold the principles of Democracy and 
strike down the Republican oligarchy that threatened the 
very existence of the Republic. Under these inspiring 
appeals, Tammany would nominate local officers whose char- 
acter, and almost identity, were in many cases lost in the 
excitement and furore of the National or State elections. 

If, on the other hand, a strong, independent movement 
had arisen, threatening to divide the Democratic vote on 
local issues, and possibly elect, let us say, an independent, 
or anti-Machine, Mayor, then it was that the Machine men 
of both camps joined hands, of course not on the surface, 
l)ut down, down underneath, and determined that no cal 
amity like that of an independent Mayor should upset pol- 
itical methods in New York. Of course the Republican 
Machine could not openly support a Taimnany candidate, 
nor could it elect a candidate of its own, but it could do the 
next best thing ; it could, by nominating a dummy candidate, 
so divide the opposition to Tammany, that that organiza- 
tion's triumph was assured. 

You may ask, in amazement, why should a Republican 
politician prefer a Tammany Mayor to an independent 



828 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

Mayor, even thougli that independent Mayor be a 
Republican ? 

The answer is simplicity itself : A Machine Republican 
believes he has far better chances of making an "honest" 
living under a Machine Mayor, even if it be the Tammany 
Machine, than he would have under an anti-Machine Mayor, 
even though that Mayor be a Republican. 

It is true that once in a while an independent Mayor has 
been elected owing to popular uprisings against Machine 
rule, but after a season or so the reformers relaxed their 
energies, old methods were resumed and New York re- 
lapsed into its former lethargy. 

Among the many " deals" between the political Machines 
in this city, that which culminated in the election of Hugh 
J. Grant for Mayor in 1888, was very transparent. Abram 
S. Hewitt, a Democrat of national reputation, had been con- 
cluding his term of Ma3^or, during which his independent 
course had given offence to Machine men generally, and to 
those of Tanmiany Hall in particular. He was looked upon 
for several months prior to election as the choice of all the 
anti-Tammany forces for re-election. Hewitt was accept- 
able to a large number of Republicans. But, on the other 
hand, what use could Machine Republicans make of him ? 
Far better, it seemed to them, would it be to make Grant 
Mayor rather than Hewitt, who although he might appoint 
Republicans to office, would never appoint the kind of men 
the Republican Machine wanted. Besides, there could be 
no "private business" done under Hewitt's administration ,♦ 

So with a great flourish of trumpets the Republicans 
nominated Joel B. Erhardt for Mayor, knowing full well 
that this action was throwing the election of Mayor and the 
other municipal officers to Tammany Hall. 

I must stop here and tell a story illustrative of the man- 
ner in which small incidents sometimes effect great re- 
sults. Oswald Ottendorfer, an able leader of the German 



HYPOCRISY IN POLITICAL STRATEGY. 820 

race in this City, the distin<^iiishcd and venerable editor of 
the /Staats ZeiUing, and one of the foremost of our public- 
spirited citizens, was an admirer of Mayor Hewitt and 
strongly connnended his independent course as Cliief 
Magistrate of the City. But lie was anxious about the 
re-election of Cleveland for President, and feared that the 
division of the Democratic forces on the Mayoralty contest 
would disrupt the Democratic vote on the Electoral ticket. 
Desiring that the Democracy should present a solid front 
to the enemy in New York, Mr. Ottcndorfer, through the 
Staats Zeitung, urgently advised that both Democratic 
candidates for Mayor, Hewitt and Grant, with the approval 
of the County Democracy and Tammany Hall, the organ- 
izations supporting them respectively, should withdraw 
from the contest, and that some man who was unobjection- 
able to both sides be substituted as a United Democratic 
candidate. 

Croker well knew Hewitt's disposition, and cunningly 
devised a scheme to use it to his own political advantage. 
His aim was to turn the powerful columns of the Staats 
Zeitung from its advocacy of Hewitt to condemnation of 
him, thereby aiding Grant, the Tammany candidate. This 
is how he did it : Croker had a confidential friend, who 
was on terms of intimacy with Hewitt, whom he sent to 
that gentleman to sound him on the question of withdrawal 
as proposed by the Staats Zeitu7ig. Hewitt, who of course 
knew nothing of Croker's hand in the matter, became in- 
dignant at the suggestion and, as Croker expected, peremp- 
torily refused to even entertain the proposition. Thus 
satisfied of Hewitt's position, Croker that very night visited 
Mr. Ottendorfer at his house and, with a great show of 
fairness and self-sacrifice, stated that in the interests of the 
National ticket he was willing to withdraw Grant, provided 
Mr. Ottendorfer would secure the withdrawal of Hewitt. 
This apparently generous and patriotic offer, coming from 



S30 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

the Tammany leader, induced Mr. Ottendorfer to form a 
new opinion of Croker, and lie said lie would immediately 
address himself to the duty of securing Mr. Hewitt's with- 
drawal, which he believed as a matter of course Hewitt 
would consent to. Next day when Mr. Ottendorfer's con- 
fidential go-between waited on Hewitt and presented the 
proposition, Hewitt not only scornfully rejected it, but in- 
timated that he regarded it in the light of an insult as 
coming from Mr. Ottendorfer. In the strained relations 
that followed, neither gentleman knew anything of the 
cunning plot which had been set up for the discomfiture 
of both. 

But to return to the " deals " and operations of both Ma- 
chines. 

No more glaring instance of the power of Machine men 
of both parties, when they have an understanding, can be 
given than what occurred in the election for Mayor of 
Greater New York in 1897. 

This was the year and the occasion, above all others, 
most favorable for the election of an independent Mayor. 
The new State Constitution provided for the separation of 
National and State elections from City elections, and the 
question of the selection of Mayor was divorced from all 
other questions but that of the best administration for the 
City. Besides, the City was entering upon a new career 
under the consolidation which largely widened the surface 
of its domain and made its population three millions 
and a half. So the people were greatly moved by the' 
gravity of the duty before them, in selecting a Mayor and 
other ofiicers under whose auspices the City would enter on 
its new mission for four years. The Public Press gave 
voice to the popular sentiment and everything pointed to 
the election of an independent Mayor. Setli Low, a Re- 
publican in politics, was the popular choice, irrespective of 
party. He seemed to possess every qualification for the 



FINE WOUi; OF COHI'ORATIONS IX POLITICS. 8^1 

liiu'li office — experience, ener<;y, iiitei:;ritv and ;il)ility. 
Hut lie was l)eateii at the election. How ^ The ohl, 
oUl storv. The Hej)nhlican Machine men did it. It 
mattered not that he was a Repuhlicaii and that lie was 
twice nominated by the Republicans of the City of Brook- 
lyn for Mayor and twice victorious in that Democratic City; 
Machine men scowled at him and they knew why. But in 
addition to his being objectionable to Machine men, there 
was another circumstance which settled his fate as a candi- 
date. The Citizens' Union had nominated him on the 
strength of the signatures of 127,000 voters who bad ex- 
pressed their preference for him in writing, a most extra- 
ordinary manifestation of popular strength, but its platform 
declared in favor of Municipal ownership of railroad fran- 
chises, the enforcement of the eight-hour labor law and 
other advanced measures affecting street surface railroads. 
This platform Low accepted and approved of " as he under- 
stood it." This was bad enough, but Low went further and 
declared in his letter of acceptance, dated September 13, 
\^U7, that additional legislation should be had which " will 
enable the City to treat every consent to a change of motive 
power of street railroads as a new franchise,''^ and in order to 
show that he meant what he said, he added : " It is utterly 
unreasonable that because of defective legislation, these valu- 
able grants should be given away without compensation to 
the City." This utterance was his undoing. What could he 
expects Here were nearly all the surface railroads in the 
City contemj^lating a change of motive power from horse or 
cable to electricity. They never paid a dollar of percent- 
age of gross receipts to the City because they were organ- 
ized under special grants prior to the general railroad law 
which provides for sales at public auction, percentages of 
gross receipts, and so forth. This proposition of Low was 
to compel compliance with those provisions, from which 
these corporations were up to that time exempt, and the 



832 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

mere suggestion of sncli a thing was sufficient to give a 
violent shock to the Metropolitan, the Third Avenue and 
other street surface railroads. Even if the Mayor so elected 
should never be able to carry out the policy so emphatically 
laid down by Mr. Low, the mere advocacy of it, which rail- 
road magnates denounced as "revolutionary," would ad- 
versely affect the stock of these enterprises to the extent of 
millions of dollars. 'No wonder railroad monopolists were 
excited. Edward Lauterbach, only a short time before 
Chairman of the Republican County Committee, and then 
as now Counsel for the Third Avenue Railroad, changed 
front upon the principle laid down by the Constitutional 
Convention of 1897, whereof he was one of the guiding 
spirits, which declares : 

" We seek to separate, in large cities, municipal elections from State 
and National elections, to the end that the business affairs of our great 
municipal corporations may be managed upon their own merits, uncon- 
trolled by National and State politics; and to the end also that the great 
issues of National and State politics may be determined upon their merits, 
free from the disturbing and often demoralizing effect of local contests." 

Now in the grave concern of his clients' interests he 
hastened to the Republican County Committee and declared 
himself in favor of a straight-out Republican nomination, 
and witli great force and eloquence urged that the adminis- 
tration of the City Government should be strictly under 
the influence of party organization, and that the principles 
of partisan government should " permeate it from top to 
bottom and extend from centre to circumference." But all 
this seemed to be unavailing, for Mr. Lauterbach was an- 
swered by a quotation from the platform on which Mr. Low 
was nominated by the Republican party for Mayor of the 
City of Brooklyn, and which declares : 

I. Questions of National or State politics have to-day no proper place 
in the selection of candidates for our municipal offices, nor in the prac- 
tical administration of our municipal business. 

II. The successful conduct of the affairs of our City depends upoa 



A BOSS FOOLED BY A DEPUTY BOSS. 833 

the election to office of men of tried intej^crity and proved capacitj-, who 
■will not use the power and patronage attathcd to tlielr ])ositioiis for 
factional or partisan ends, but manage the public business acconiing to 
essentially the same methods they would employ in the honest and 
efficient conduct of their own private business. 

The eloquence and zeal suspected to have been inspired 
by personal interests were for the most part lost upon 
those who wanted success at the jjolls. Low's strength 
was <:;rowing in spite of sinister opposition and " pulls " and 
railroads and all. Van Cott, the Kepublican Postmaster 
of this. City, a confidential adviser of Piatt, publicly fa- 
vored the acceptance of Low's candidacy. It was a critical 
time for the street railroad corporations, and the very at- 
mosphere seemed to be charged with danger. 

A '• Destroying Angel " was needed. He came in a new 
shape. At this juncture a great street railroad magnate, 
a distinguished Democrat, waited upon a potent Republican 
leader, or, to speak more correctly, a potent Kepublican 
deputy-leader, and represented to him the dire catastrophe 
that would befall the City if Low were elected Mayor, and 
before he got through he reasoned the deputy-leader into 
liis way of thinking; and, lo and behold! in a day or two 
all the Republican district leaders of the City were " inocu- 
lated." The feeling began to run high against Low, and 
such is the potency of even a deputy-Boss, that many of 
those district leaders who the week before were whispering 
of Low's strength and dilating upon his virtues, now 
suddenly changed front, and the only man who could save 
them from crushing defeat in their respective Assembly 
districts and win most of their local offices for them, as 
well as all the City and County oflices, including that of 
Mayor, was abused and denounced and almost hounded. 
Piatt, who would have accepted Low, but who as Boss-in- 
chicf was on too high an eminence to know what was going 
on beneath, was astonished at this general hostility to Low, 
little dreaming how it had been manufactured. Bending 



834 TlUin Y YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

before what he thought to be a genuine spontaneous op- 
position, he permitted Low to be set aside. It was a great, 
bold game. The distinguished Democrat, having made 
the desired impression upon the potent Republican deputy- 
leader, forthwith went to Europe so as to be " out of the 
way." Croker, who was in Europe, returned home per- 
fectly confident of the triumph of Tammany Kail. Before 
starting from England he was undoubtedly convinced that 
Low would never get tlie Republican nomination or endorse- 
ment. Low had already accepted the Citizen's nomination 
and declared that he would remain in the field and stand for 
the principles of its platform, be his friends " few or many." 
It was therefore to Croker a clear case of a division of the 
enemy. He returned to New York, brushed aside Sheehan, 
whom he had heretofore proclaimed as Tammany's only 
leader, and with great ostentation took personal charge of 
the campaign. 

The Republican Machine nominated Gen. Benjamin F. 
Tracy, who, to the surprise of the friends of good govern- 
ment, permitted himself to be used as a stalking-horse. 
Out of a total vote cast of 526,556, Van Wyck (Tammany) 
received 233,99Y ; Low (Citizens' Union) 151,540 ; Tracy 
(Republican) 101,863 ; Henry George, Jr., (Labor) 21,693 ; 
while the remaining 17,000 votes were scattered among 
nominees of minor parties or factions. The combined vote 
for Low and Tracy would have sufficed to defeat the Tam- 
many candidate. 

Even as it was, had not Henry George, the idol of the 
Labor party, died in the midst of the canvass, he would 
have polled 50,000 more votes than the 21,000 that were 
cast for his son (who was nominated by the Labor lead- 
ers as a forlorn hope to fill the vacancy). In his first 
contest for the Mayoralty, in 1886. against Abram S. 
Hewitt, who was the United Democratic nominee, George 
polled upwards of 70,000 votes in Manhattan Island and 



AN INSTRUCTIVE AND INSPIRING CONTEST. 835 

the annexed Wards above the Ilarleni ; and in 1S97 in a 
quadninguhir struiio-le, he was making a vigorous and, his 
foHowers believed, a winning contest. "NVlien lie died, all 
hope of success vanished from his followers, the mass of 
whom, to the nund)er of 50,000 at least, distracted and 
demoralized by the sudden and tragic end of their leader, 
drifted into Tammany Hall, which they regarded as the 
regular Democratic organization. 

Ilad Henry George lived to iinish his canvass, Tam- 
many's vote for Yan Wyck would then have been 183,907 
rather than 233,997, or only 32,457 more than Low" polled ; 
and it is not stretching a point to say that in tlie midst of 
the whirlwind canvass George was making at the time he 
was stricken dowji, there Avould have been on election day 
more than enough votes turned over to Low, from Dem- 
ocrats and Republicans who dreaded the election of Henry 
George, to overcome the difference required to have made 
Low iirst Mayor of Greater New York, instead of Yan 
AVyck, who had, shortly after his inauguration, the appoint- 
ment of nearly two hundred officials under the New Charter, 
which patronage, in the hands of a bold and independent 
Chief Magistrate of the City, like Low, would have sealed 
the doom of Bossism. 

Low's strength as a popular candidate was in many re- 
spects marvellous. It furnishes an instructive and inspiring 
lesson to those who are striving for independence in politics. 
The attitude of both the Republican and Tammany factions 
towards each other during the campaign corroborates the 
accusation that the purpose of Tracy's nomination was to 
defeat Low. The eolunms of the public press and the 
records of the campaign show that no abuse or vilification 
was leveled at Tracy (the Republican candidate) from the 
Tammany camp, and that no word of abuse or vililicatiou 
came from the liepublican camp against Yan Wyck (the 
Tammany candidate), " a fellow feeling" making them 



836 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

" wondrous kind ; " but by a concert of action e very- 
Tammany and every Republican orator, newspaper organ, 
talker, writer, and sliouter denounced, day after day and 
night after night, the candidacy of Low and made him 
personally the object of vilification and abuse. Tlien came 
the secret but powerful influence of Corporate Monopoly 
to undermine his strength and arrest the progress of his 
canvass. Money was poured in like water, from the cor- 
poration magnates who dreaded the possibility of his elec- 
tion, to be be spent in the dark and devious ways known to 
electioneering experts, in order to accomplish his defeat. 

Supported only by the independent Press and the in- 
dependent voter. Low, without a machine, and in spite of 
combined attack, strode far past his Republican opponent 
in the race, and perhaps but for the death of Henry George, 
as above stated, might have also outstripped his Tammany 
opponent. At all events, there is a lesson, a warning, and 
an inspiration in Low's battle against the allied Machines. 



LETTER LXIV. 

Curious Fluctuations in the Fortunes of Bossism— Its 
Brief Defeats and Ratid Revivals— Responsibility for 
ITS Present Audacity— Culpable Neglect of Duty by 
Wealthy and Intelligent Citizens— How to Get Rid 
OF Political Wolves— Earnest and Sustained Effort 
THE Price of Good Government. 

My dear Dean: 

111 all intellectual efforts it is not an easy task to 
make appropriate concluding observations. The essayist, 
the letter- writer, the historian, the lecturer, the orator, the 
preacher— all endeavor to make their closing sentences 
specially impressive. 

Perhaps the most effective thing I can say in concluding 
these letters is that I have faithfully labored to present 
only true pictures of the characters I have discussed, and 
true accounts of the episodes I have related. 

The moral of the work is, I believe, easily discernible. 
Throughout its pages it is shown, by examples, how liberty 
may become its own destroyer in the opportunities it 
affords for the growth of public abuses ; how human nature 
may degenerate into base corruption under conditions 
most favorable to individual and civic virtue; how the 
vigilance, which is " the price of liberty," can never be 
relaxed without danger to the community ; how success, no 
matter by what means, glorifies the victor, for the time 
being, condones the infamies of the past, and makes 
"statesmen" of street-corner politicians; how, when the 
politician rises to high power, he is almost worshipped by the 
people, even though his elevation has been achieved at the 
expense and by the degradation of the public ; how a greater 



837 



838 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

mimber of people respect the man who makes them his 
slaves than the man who makes sacritices in tlieir interest ; 
how the politicians dupe the people, and seem to be 
admired by their dupes all the more because of their dex- 
terity in doing so ; how they erect a one-man power under 
this government of the many ; how they rise to more than 
royal authority and insolence in a free republic ; how, almost 
at a spring, they acquire gigantic fortunes, spend them 
ostentatiously, and snap their fingers at the people whom 
they cajole and rob and laugh at. 

Then there is presented another picture : the people 
aroused ; their eyes opened to flagrant malefactions, they are 
seized with a great moral spasm ; the power of the ballot 
is invoked ; heretofore it was in use, but carelessly and 
indifferently ; now, under the motive power of internal 
convulsion, the ballot is held firmly for the destruction 
of the culprits. 

A few hours accomplish the great work. Down tumbles 
the political edifice as though made of sand ; retributive 
justice pursues the malefactors and makes them felons, or 
refugees and outcasts. Thus justice overtook the great 
apostle of public plunder ; the man who bought up Legisla- 
tures, Democratic and Republican — whether high-priced 
or low-priced, mattered not ; who used Judges as men 
of straw and Grand Jurors as common tools ; who presided 
over political orgies and splendid carnivals of crime, which 
dazzled the people, while he and his confederates rifled the 
treasury. Tweed — the mighty Tweed — who revelled in 
luxury and exercised the power of a Caesar in the City and 
State, was crushed almost at one blow from a peaceful 
weapon in the hands of the citizen. From the blow 
which felled him he never recovered, dying a jail-bird, 
deserted and shunned by the army of sycophants and 
flatterers who had swarmed about him in the days of his 
"Dower. 



INEXCUSABLE N EG LICENCE OF CITIZENS. 839 

All tills was a great mor;;! lesson, hut was it enduring? 
The answer ean be fouml in the pages of this volume. 

A new Bossisin was sutl'ered to rise from the ashes of the 
old, bold in its progress, arrogant in its assumption, and 
defiant in its autocracy. The lesson of the past was so far 
forgotten that even a still bolder Boss came to the surface, 
until political tyranny has become more rauipant, and 
j)olitical dictatorship more offensive, than in the days when 
Tweed's power was torn to fragments. 

Keviewing these conditions, past and present, what must 
be the verdict i Have the citizens of New York City dis- 
charged their duty ^ With the lessons of the past vividly be- 
fore them, how conies it that they have allowed Rings and 
Bosses to flourish again ? With the constitutional weapon 
of the ballot in their hands, what excuse can they offer for 
the insolent autocratic power which at present overshad- 
ows the destiny of this great metropolis? What apology 
can they make for the shameful and degrading domination 
of one man in a City of freemen ? Can they pretend that 
it is not ignominious and injurious, or that they like it and 
enjoy it as a luxury^ No: for no people desire to be 
robbed and at the same time be held up to the contempt 
and ridicule of the world. Can they pretend that they are 
unable to stoj) it and crush it ? No : for this would be a 
slander on the efficacy of the ballot, and directly at variance 
with the teachings of history. 

This City should be the focus from which would radiate 
the greatest intellectual and moral force of the country. 
With its vast wealth, its unbounded resources, its foremost 
place in every field of enterprise, its multitude of intelligent 
men and women, its great army of honest toiler.-^, its status 
and dignity as the second City of the world, New York, 
with its nearly four millions of inhabitants, should be able 
to boast of a City Government that would stand out as an 
exemplar for all other municipalities of the country, and 



840 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

tjpifj the highest and best results of popular sover- 
eignty for the admiration and applause of the world. 

AVhat answer, then, can its citizens make for neglecting the 
stewardship which the right of a free ballot imposes upon 
them ? What is their plea of defence as the trustees of 
this sacred trust ? Is their plea that of one from whose 
custody property had been abstracted, who avers that the 
law, in that particular case, did not compel him to be vigilant ? 

Men of wealth and standing there are in New York who 
have large interests to protect, who should love their native 
City for the generous opportunities it has afforded them, 
who should jealously guard its honor as the future home of 
their children and their children's children, enthusiasts in 
yachting and horse-racing and fashionable functions, but 
who have no thought for the evils which degrade and 
humiliate their City in the eyes of the civilized world. 
With them public questions affecting the municipal gov- 
ernment are beneath their assumed dignity, and to take an 
active interest in matters which affect the rights, indepenxl- 
ence and financial interests of their fellow-citizens, is not 
only distasteful, but vulgar. Yet, on great occasions, this 
class of persons prates pompously of the corrupt practices 
and official wrong-doing which affiict New York. 

And there are those, too, who give enormous sums of 
money in charity, and who help to build churches and 
eleemosynary institutions, who — God reward them ! — succor 
the needy, the lame, the halt and the blind, but who, in 
their noble work, never stop to think of the evils they 
could uproot by giving a portion of their attention to prob- 
lems which would benefit the community as a whole, lift 
up the people of this City from political serfdom, stop tlie 
looting of the people's treasury, lessen the burdens of taxa- 
tion, and advance our City, clean-robed, in all that contrib- 
utes to her greatness and to the happiness and comfort of 
her citizens. 



WHY NEW YORK IS HELD I\ POLITICAL BONDAGE. 841 

And there passes along, also without heed, tlie great army 
of iiKhistrv, be it of brain or ninsclo, eacli iii(livi(hial busy 
witli Ills own ])ersonal conet!rns, giving scarcely a ])assing 
glance at (juestions wliich ati'ect his most sacred rights, and 
looking on with indifference at the City of his birth or 
aduptiuu ill the possession of a band of political marauders, 
whose highest purpose is to secure public plunder, and 
whose highest education is the method by which they can 
safely accomplish it. 

Thus, through their own culpable negligence, are the 
citizens of New York iield in political subjugation by an 
irresponsible power vested in one man, who vauntingly 
parades his authority and scorns the rumblings of dis- 
content. 



From what has been recorded in the foregoing letters 
it may be readily seen that the task of uprooting, or even 
checking, Bossism, and all that it implies, is not one to be 
lightly considered and undertaken. From the history of 
the struggles which from time to time have taken place to 
oppose the power of Eings and Bosses it is a satisfaction to 
know, however, that the people are always ready to listen 
to reason — that, if properly invited to participate in move- 
ments for the benefit of the community, they are quick to 
respond. But to enlist their co-operation, the plan i)roposed 
must be practical ; the object to be attained must be reason- 
able, not visionary ; and, above all, the movement must be 
properly directed. 

So manv reform agitations have proven to be but instru- 
ments for elevating to otfice men who were foremost in 
them, that the public often hesitates to interest itself even 
in a good cause, fearing to be used for selfish ends. 

Show to the public a practical plan, the advocates of 
which are known to be above the suspicion of selfishness, 



842 THIRTY YEARS OF NEW YORK POLITICS. 

and legions of citizens will flock to its support. Men im- 
bued with the American spirit delight in chastising political 
insolence. Take any one hundred men whom jon chance 
to run across in Broadway or any other crowded thorough- 
fare of our City, and, could 3'ou get them into a room, you 
may be sure that ninety-nine out of the hundred would 
agree on the proposition that no one-man power should 
control the public affairs of this great community; that, 
moreover, they would emphatically denounce the system 
of using political power to monopolize all business profits 
in dealing with the City Government, to the detriment of 
the public interest and to the heartless destruction of in- 
dividual enterprise. 

The argument which addresses itself to one hundred 
men will address itself to hundreds of thousands under 
similar circumstances. Therefore it follows that the whole 
case resolves itself into the question of adopting some plan 
whereby the people at large may be reached, their intelli- 
gence appealed to and their conscience awakened. 

There have been plans adopted in the past which were 
efiicacious for the time being, but they lacked permanence 
of purpose and were ephemeral in their results, except for 
a moral warning. Such was the fate of the Committee of 
Seventy which, after accomplishing so wonderful a work as 
the overthrow of Tweed and his hosts, became disinte- 
grated by selfish office-seekers, until it dwindled away to 
make a mere page instead of a chapter in history. So it 
was with the Committee of One Hundred of the County 
Democracy which, when it drove Tammany from the 
municipal reservation, coolly settled down to enjoy the 
good things of life from the political table at which its 
adversaries had so long fattened. 

None of these organizations, which were started so 
proudly, undertook to stand permanent guard over the 
public interests. They slept on their vantage ground and 



THK PROni.F.M OF THE lioru. ^3 

the political wolves iift.-r a wl.iU' ma.l.' their wav Lack to 
their okl domain. 

The prohh'in of tlie hour now is, not merely to defeat 
the Bosses, l.ut, having defeated them, to keep this ohnoxi- 
ous fi-ature oi our politics out of sight forever in this 
City. 



} 



/VV 



*D 



.1.V 



LB 



«tyi 





.- / -. --^- ,^°-\ •^- /°%^ V 














> 






^ 




,0^ 



,V ^'^^ 








.A 









•^'^^ 



Mo 






V. "^^^ c'^"^ ^>^.^%\ u ^ 






' .<y ° A^ V "^ <v^ %*•>•>' 













0^ '"'^ 







